D Does Dimensions Alternate
by aquadulcis
Summary: Crossover between the Hellsing manga and Vampire Hunter D novels. In which a vampire becomes inebriated, a goose is Catholic, DRBs make a mess and D finds out where Dracula went after all these years.
1. Prologue

**Prologue:**

Castle Iocus loomed above the province of Vanus Conatus like a twisted bird of ill omen. Though its nobility were purportedly long dead, its bowels were still filled to bursting with their experiments. For miles around there was naught but wasteland, as though the taint of evil had cursed the ground to barrenness. The thought of that horrible place inspired fear into the hearts of even the most stalwart hunters. To approach the castle was foolish to the extreme, to enter it suicide, especially during the long night.

A tall, slight figure walked out of the castle's large entrance hall just as the sun began to peak over the horizon. The coloured lights of morning showed that the creature was a handsome youth of inhuman beauty. He gazed toward the distance with a pure and devastating melancholia that hurt the heart that would witness it. He stood alert yet seemed completely lost within his own quiet contemplation. A pale hand emerged from his long cloak, touching near his heart. He tapped his fingers three times and narrowed his eyes. His hand moved up toward his neck, tugging back his collar and groping inside somewhat desperately.

The ethereal man looked behind him, into the interior of the castle. He glimpsed back once, toward the day and sighed visibly. He turned elegantly on one heel and strode back inside. He swerved erratically over the ornate, but fading, carpeting before disappearing down a side passage. He confidently ran down a twisting stairway, occasionally having to jump over the bodies of hideous beasts that he had likely killed himself. He stopped after a time, in front of a large suit of armour. It had a bright, blue pendant snagged on its spear. The youth reached for it, slicing his thumb as he took hold of the trinket. He frowned at the wound before again retracing his steps.

When he again entered the illuminated hall he reached up to fasten his necklace. For a short moment his focus fell onto the parrot clip that secured it. In that moment he tripped, throwing his adornment forward with his newly acquired momentum. He pushed his right arm forward to brace for impact but hit nothing but air. He fell.

The necklace landed safely on the carpet but the stunning youth was nowhere to be seen.

----------

Walter entered Integra's office bearing tea in one hand and bad news in the other. She accepted the former while he gave her the latter.

"Sir, I'm afraid that Seras has gone missing within the Wepcom complex." His ageing face pinched together unhappily as he said the words, "It seems that there is far more to it that Lord Horatio led us to believe."

"In what sense?" Integra breathed in the steam from the tea, apparently unaffected by the situation.

"The geese have thoroughly explored all five floors of the institution and have been unable to locate her." Walter paused, "They also have yet to find any of the beasts that were reported."

Integra snorted.

"I knew that he'd built subterranean floors to that laboratory, trust Seras to find them."

Integra stood and gathered her coat.

"I'll send Alucard ahead, would you mind preparing a car, Walter?" she drew a cigar from within the confines of her breast pocket, "I have a feeling that tonight is going to be an interesting night."

She snipped the end of the cigar and lit it with poise unusual to the act of smoking. She inhaled, she exhaled and she walked away.

* * *

Thank you to everyone that's stuck around long enough for me to update this annoyingly time-eating parody of mine. The story is now finished in its entirety and edits have been made to the old chapters to make certain characters motivations more apparent and also to aid in the legibility of the plot. You may notice that I renamed the Castle in the Prologue, I only did it because it occured to me that Nightbreak might sound as though it was an unintentionally silly name. Now it's poorly translated latin fun, which sort of ties in with slight HP lampooning that happens later on... I'll post a new chapter every few days until I hit the Epilogue.


	2. Chapter One

**Chapter One: D is hurt repeatedly.**

The room was pitch-black, so dark that night-vision ceased to function. The youth, well, he would have been identifiable as the youth from Castle Iocus had there been some light, was beginning to feel that he was in trouble. His delicate ears could hear _something_ stirring in the dungeon around him. He walked slowly, carefully through the darkness, stopping when he reached a wall. He placed his left hand upon it and it came away coated in slime. Something like an old man's voice pierced the silence with a grumbling expletive. The youth turned away from the unascendable partition and began to search for another way out.

Without warning he flicked his hand toward the darkness and was rewarded with an angry growl. He reached into his pocket and withdrew a handful of wooden needles, each as long as his hand. More of the creatures were gathering, calling to each-other with bark-like growls. He heard a small scuffle ensue from where he had thrown his first dart. He looked at his bloodied thumb, not because he could see it but because of the minor dramatic and expository effect.

"Dimension-ripping beasts." His voice was older than the rest of him, like water over stone.

"You do know that blood is mighty conspicuous to those things, don't you?" a second voice replied, apparently from nowhere and sounding suspiciously like the beautiful youth had when he'd cursed… That was him cursing, wasn't it? (1)

The pretty man clenched his left hand into a fist and released it. There was no point talking to it if it was feeling unhelpful.

He hit the floor, feeling movement overhead as he did. He threw a spike into the air but hit rock, not flesh. The creatures drew closer and he counted roughly fifteen in all. He drew his sword, not that it was going to do much good. He swung it thrice and hit naught each time. It kept the monsters at bay but they were still circling. If only he had his smoke bombs to confuse them. He'd left them in his saddle, with his horse that was grazing outside. Dhampires weren't exceptionally well known for their luck…

-------

D the dhampire vampire hunter was engaged in a fight for his life against monsters that could phase out from under him, or appear behind him in the time it took to blink an eyelid. Sensors on the bottom of their jaws allowed them to 'see' heat. He was giving off enough to be noticeable to them. They had enormously powerful noses and each drop of blood made him as obvious as a tall man in an orange suit with Tourette's syndrome. D didn't like so much colourful imagery in his diet but his hand did and it seemed to be rubbing off on him. He did not like Dimension-rippers either, the closest he'd ever gotten to doing so was when he'd found out they'd eaten the geneticist behind their creation. He was aware of the fact that he was at a distinct disadvantage. He was going to have a difficult time hitting them as well, he had already ascertained that they felt the sword coming in advance and jumped dimensions before it could hit them.

"Ah." He said quietly to himself.

He bent his knees and waited for another beast to approach. He listened intently for the sound of paws moving over rock and then waited until he could smell its breath. The creature exhaled loudly, tensing for a jump. D made a wild swing as the monster launched itself at him and rolled into it. He hit the dimensional portal just as it was closing and then he kept on moving. He found himself bathed in light and with vision he could win. The creature bowled over as he ran at it. He aimed beneath its exposed ribs and pierced its heart before it could regain its footing. It collapsed, releasing an ugly cry and an awful stench. D ignored this and cleaned his blade on the animals' long fur.

As he stood, he checked for other adversaries and found that there were none. He turned gracefully and surveyed his new surroundings. He was in a long, white corridor. Eerie, sterile light was coming from bars hooked to the ceiling. The ground beneath his feet was hard and slippery. It had a geometric pattern inscribed upon it but it wasn't rock or tile nor was it a synthetic material he was used to. There were doors on either side of him. It was probably a laboratory from the days when vampires had such technology.

There was nothing for it but to start walking.

-------

After traipsing up and down stairs and along corridors for twenty minutes, D remained trapped inside the lab. He had an ever-increasing map of his new home, as his left hand had called it but he was no closer to understanding its nature. The metal-work on the doors was unlike any he had ever seen, sturdy but far smaller and lighter than those used in a normal vampire castle but the doors themselves seemed to be only plywood coated in a thin polymer. The process must have been industrialised because a smithy would have been incapable of creating work of such magnitude and no decent carpenter would produce such shoddy work. There was clearly no craftsmanship involved here and he was vaguely disturbed by how unguarded everything was. After some searching D encountered a door unlike the rest. It was not connected to a room, it was thicker, presumably a fire door. A sign indicated that an alarm was attached to it and D did not want to risk disarming technology that was currently alien to him. He pressed his ear to it on the off-chance and heard approaching footsteps. He backed away into a nearby alcove.

The door opened loudly and permitted the entry of one individual. Their footsteps were heavy, and from their frequency he predicted a large man. What he saw from his dark nook was decidedly female, pale calves tapering to heavy boots. He could hear the muffled laughter of his parasite, questioning his sexuality if he was mistaking women for tubby men. He ignored it. When she finally came into full view he saw that he was dealing with a girl, six-foot tall and well-built. He was taken-aback slightly by her appearance. Most of the women he met were stunningly beautiful and slim. This one was cute enough but busting out of an inappropriately revealing uniform. He had to admit that his pride was a little bruised by the fact that she hadn't noticed him yet.

She cocked a giant rifle onto her shoulder and he rethought his previous assessment. He'd meet her later on, when he'd ascertained how competent she was. She glanced backwards, eyebrows drawn together in a frown. D melted further into the shadows. In profile he saw her bite at her lip, displaying prominent canines. She was nobility. The strangest (and that was saying something) noble that he'd ever seen. She turned towards the corridor and he followed.

The girl made a beeline for the corridor he'd arrived in, taking experimental sniffs whenever she hit a crossroad. He stayed out of sight, listening for the squeaky sound of her feet hitting the floor. It took her a minute to reach the beast that he'd left. He heard her sharp intake of breath. She fumbled for a short while, pulling something out of a holster. Her breath came out shakily, even though she technically didn't need to breathe at all.

"Captain, do you copy?"

Radio static and disjointed words responded. The girl whimpered a little, they must have been too far underground for radios to work. D waited for her next move. She was loudly circling the corpse. Crouching now, sniffing the air once more. The corridor was deathly quiet apart from the soft hum of the lights. She stood again.

"There's someone else here." She said quietly and to herself, she looked at her watch and then glanced around again, skittishly.

D decided that was probably a good time to reveal himself. He stepped quietly into the girl's line of sight. His black cloak trailed behind him, as if stirred by a gentle breeze. He did not say anything but kept his eyes firmly focused upon her. The girl gasped at the sight of him.

His left hand rolled its eyes.

Now that he could see her face D was again a little surprised to see that she was not an ethereal beauty like most vampires were. The girl was blonde, blue-eyed and as solid as she'd seemed earlier. She froze, lips parted and gun dropping toward her side. She pointed a finger limply toward him, mouth gaping like a fish.

"M-master!" She managed after a lengthy pause, "Master, what on _earth_ are you wearing?"

"That's a new one." D clenched his fist again to shut up his symbiont.

"Master, I…" The girl seemed to be avoiding looking at him if possible, "Master, you're supposed to be at home, I mean, I think we should all go home now and look for your red hat and that fancy tie-bow thing you like so much and then I think I should go to bed, please Master."

He was glad that the odd noble was non-threatening but her behaviour confused him. He was no ones master and he never had been. He was also expecting a more fearful reaction to his presence. Most vampires responded to him in two ways, fight or flight. There was a third option but it too involved screaming of a sort and was only slightly less messy than the others. He eventually decided to respond in the way he did to all excitable women. Monotone and short sentences.

"My name is D; I do not know who your master is."

The girl blinked, clearly perplexed. Her hands tightened perceptibly on her weapon but she did not raise it. She was tense but he could just tell she knew better than to take him on. Her eyes darted toward the creature on the floor then back toward him. She started to smile gormlessly.

"Oh, your name is _D _and we have never met before, obviously." She hugged her giant rifle to her bosom, "Wonderful, lovely, yes."

"Yes."

"Did you kill the… dog-thing?"

"Yes."

She shifted away from him slightly. She began to gnaw on her lip, exposing her pointed teeth yet again.

"What is it?"

"A dimension-ripping beast. I followed it here." D decided to start volunteering information because he didn't want to be standing in the hall all day.

"It doesn't have any eyes, does it?"

"No."

"Ah."

"Yes."

"You look like a… That's a very interesting ou…" She drew a hand over her eyes, "You're not from around here are you?"

"No. I hail from the same region as that beast."

"I think that maybe you should come with me. Sir Hellsing should know what to do." She didn't seem sure on the last note. He was guessing that her cohort would not look so kindly upon him. It was probably a risk he'd have to take.

"My name is Seras." She smiled, shyly this time.

It took a while but she eventually found them both an exit. She kept her back exposed the entire time.

-------

"Wait here." Seras placed a hand on his shoulder, not noticing him flinch in surprise and then walked out of the building.

D lurked inside the strange building's atrium, watching as Seras exited the clear doors. He had never seen the like before, how did they manage to reinforce them? Perhaps there was some way of producing less brittle glass in this place, it would be worth researching. While D was musing about applied chemistry someone tall and dressed in red came into view. The glass and the distance blurred his features slightly. Seras hunched slightly and made some small gestures with her hands. The man, at least he presumed this one actually was a man, straightened and barked something at her. The girl recoiled, posture meekly subservient. D reached for his sword.

He had barely taken three steps before the man was on him. He was fast, aggressive and completely unpredictable, almost diametrically opposed to what he'd seen of Seras. The violent noble fired two shots from a large pistol and D was forced to block them with his sword. Compared to the ugly sounds of gunpowder, his blade was pure poetry. His opponents face split into an insane grin, one that was oddly familiar. D ignored it and went onto the offensive. He feinted to the left then struck with ungodly speed. His opponent's right hand fell to the floor, severed at the wrist.

The noble kept advancing, cackling with a distasteful amount of glee. D could see Seras by the doors, clearly wanting to intervene but unable to do so. The fallen appendage started to dissolve into blackening ooze. The stump warped as well, transforming into a dog with six eyes. Hell hounds had become extinct on the frontier but they were once common as pets to the nobility. The dog snarled at him.

Clearly slicing off limbs wasn't going to get him anywhere fast. He threw a volley of needles at the vampire and took off at a run. He aimed his sword at the nosferatus heart and pressed forward. The other man bent dramatically backwards at the knees, the blade knocking his glasses and hat askew without causing any damage. He pressed his gun into D's chest before he could change direction and fired off another round. Seras cried out and D flinched. He retreated and started to circle. The vampire in red was grinning inanely, his unbound hair flowing manically about his face. He looked very familiar.

Someone who looked like that…

_His black hair was tied backwards and his face was staring out over his empire. His blood-red eyes were bright and cruel. D was told that he looked just like his sire but he disliked this comparison. Their world was ending, or so he was told, time and again. Their time would come and no one would mourn their passing. He was asked what his plans for that future would be but he'd been called inside before he could reply._

Someone who looked like that used to read him bedtime stories about eviscerating his enemies. Most people had called him 'Lord' or 'King' and sometimes 'Majesty'. His mother had called him Dracula-dearest and he'd called him…

"Father."

"Huh?" His opponent went slack-jawed.

D used the moment to his advantage and smacked him one. He hit him right on the nose and was rewarded by a cathartic crunching sound. The hounds, a few more had sprouted, sniffed at his cloak during this moment. The biggest barked and then started licking at his hands. He patted its head absent-mindedly. He'd named all the hounds during his childhood. They'd all been called "Kaiser."

His adversary remained upright, although his neck was twisted uncomfortably to the side. His eyes swivelled in D's direction, pupils shrinking down to slits. His mouth thinned and stretched even further than it had when he was smiling. Seras had begun walking towards them, one hand outstretched, offering aid.

"_Master_, this is D. He killed one of the monsters that have been appearing around London." Seras again ignored propriety and touched D's shoulder, further freaking him out.

"I know him, Police girl," his face softened slightly as he addressed her, "How did you get here Junior?"

"Dimension-ripping beast."

"And here I was hoping you got here on your own steam. Oh well, Seras, I would like you to meet my son from an alternate dimension. D, this is my beloved servant Seras. Later you will no doubt meet my dearest master, Lord Integra Wingates Hellsing. Wonderful woman, I'm sure you'll agree."

"Master, you told me that vampires can't _have_ children. They can only turn people… didn't you say that?" the girl was looking rightly bothered.

"Alternate Dimension, Seras."

A mumbling came from D's left hand. He unclenched it and raised it upwards.

"Drake, is that you, you old bastard?"

"Lefty, I was hoping you were dead!"

Both D's hand and D's sire started to laugh, congenially. Seras looked on in abject horror. D made a mental note to include bombs in his personal inventories from now on so he could avoid an event such as this happening ever again. Then armed mercenaries entered the building and started shooting at him.

---------

(1)Of course not, silly. Lithe young men don't deign to curse like emphysemic sailors.


	3. Chapter Two

**Chapter Two: D comes to several conclusions. **

It had taken Seras under a minute to stop the geese from shooting at her new acquaintance. It had taken some arm waving and perilous running into their line of fire but she'd done it. He didn't seem particularly thankful because he'd used that less-than-a-minute to cross the room and point his sword at Pips jugular. After that Seras had taken a little over a minute to get between D and Pip. After that it was purely academic to have the sword re-sheathed and away from any throats. Sadly, shortly after relative peace had been restored, Integra arrived, cigar in hand, and had Walter tie D up with silver wire. Seras answered directly to Integra, so there was nothing she could do but stand around anxiously and hope for the best.

Seras was not particularly happy that she was the most ineffectual undead being in the universe. She contented herself with the fact that it was marginally better than actually being dead because dead people can't do _anything_ whatsoever.

Her master had started laughing maniacally, again, while she'd been lost in thought. Seras was not optimistic that he would stop Integra from interrogating his son. He seemed to think that life was a testing ground or maybe some kind of coliseum where everyone fought for his amusement. At least D didn't seem particularly bothered. She wasn't sure though because D hadn't looked particularly _anything_ since she'd first caught sight of him posing artfully in a hallway. There was a certain family resemblance in both appearance and affectations, when you thought about it that way.

Integra had stepped forward, maintaining a respectful distance from D. Her face was locked into her most professional stare, filled with the requisite amount of disdain. D looked confused for a moment before schooling his features into neutrality again. Walter was holding back, awaiting orders. Alucard was, still, even though it wasn't even intimidating or the least bit appropriate, cackling like an insane witch. Seras was just wishing she was at home in her coffin. Pip was thinking _exactly _the same thing.

Seras watched as Integra threw the end of her cigar into the bushes lining the path toward the Wepcom lab, took a new one from her coat and lit it. She took a long drag and leisurely exhaled. She regaled D with a cool look.

"Who the bloody hell _are_ you?" It was a petulant question but when she said it, it sounded overly reasonable. "And why are you threatening my men with a sword?"

"They started it." D had Integra's gift for terse dialogues.

Integra shifted her unrelenting gaze to Alucard, whose laughter was slowing down. Alucard wiped an invisible tear from his eye and sighed loudly. It was strange how no one seemed overly intimidated by almost _anything_ he did anymore. He'd barely got a grimace the last time he'd ripped somebody's head off and bathed in their blood…

And that had been one of the _accountants_, the really shonky one.

"Yeah, yeah, he wasn't actually doing anything." Alucard said voice still bubbling with mirth, "He's not even a vampire, just looks like one, don't you junior?"

"Junior?" Integra raised an immaculate eyebrow.

"My name is not junior."

"No, no, your mother called you Harry," there was a confused hush descending, broken only by muffled laughter coming from the vicinity of D's hand, "Harry or Harold, I can never remember which."

Integra closed her eyes and Seras swore she could hear her counting under her breath. The poised leader made a short cutting motion with her cigar and Harry was released. Walter moved to stand beside Integra and did not retreat. The now disgruntled young dhampire turned to glare at Alucard, who was un-phased. Integra looked between the two and comprehension washed over her face. She looked slightly queasy in the face of her realisation.

"I think it would be best if we adjourned until we return back to headquarters. I have your word that this stranger will explain himself there and not cause undue damage until then?" the frost in her voice was approaching perma.

"He doesn't even drink blood." Alucard waved a hand in disgust.

Seras and the geese retreated, leaving Harry alone with Alucard. Pip closed in on her personal space, more because he wanted to and less because he needed to whisper.

"Seras, who is that strange man-boy?"

"I think he's Master's son."

"I didn't know vampires could have children." Pip's voice gained a thoughtful quality that Seras subconsciously chose to ignore.

"Um… he said he was from an alternate dimension."

"Hmm, well, who are we to question the immortal king of dead things, non?"

-------

Seras hoped Master wasn't joking about D being his son because that would be exceptionally cruel. Although it might be better for her to be the butt of a joke than to have to face the reality of alternate dimensions along with all the other changes she was adapting to on a daily basis. Like periods… You'd think that vampires would not get them.

Seras' head hurt. So did her uterus.

-------

After the mass exodus of mercenaries and the police girl, there was silence. In this silence D and Alucard looked at each-other. They looked, perhaps curiously, but did not stare. D was healing slowly from his few bullet wounds and grazes. He figured he was sporting about three clean hits total, neat entries and exits with nothing lodged where it shouldn't be. His father looked as though he'd been out on a quiet stroll for illicit drugs. His grin was still manic and his attire was immaculate. D hated him for that because there was no way he could compete with the ability to mentally reconstruct damaged clothing.

"Well, son…"

Alucard got no further. D had spun on his heel and walked away from the ugly building he'd been stuck in for some hours. The nosferatu sighed and pursued him. It wasn't much of a chase if you must know. Ds stride was more of a sashay and Alucard just appeared out of a shadow in front of him.

"Harry, I'm going to be patient with you because you don't understand the gravity of your situation." Alucard's face was grave, which would have given most people a clue that it was time to leave the country. "I'm afraid you can't just go running around here, things are a little different in this reality."

D regarded him coolly. The air began to reflect his mood. Alucard was completely unaffected as a result of having experienced the boy's childish tantrums on many a previous occasion, back in the day. It would easier now that his mother wasn't around to interfere… bless her soul.

"I don't think you have the authority to command me." D's mouth was a hard line and he didn't appreciate how humorously wrong he was.

"You do have a choice. Come with me and be protected by Hellsing," Alucard paused long enough to smile nastily, "Or be hunted down by her, the Vatican and the Millennium faction."

"I don't need your protection." D had no idea who any of those people were, so it wasn't difficult to act nonchalant.

"Perhaps not but you could certainly use my advice. You look like a rent boy from an uptown S&M club." Alucard sounded slightly amused. "Is there something you're not telling me?"

Ds eyes bugged slightly and he looked genuinely confused. He wasn't used to that emotion and it twisted his face unattractively. He seemed torn between retaliating with his own critique if his father's fashion sense and asking just what a "rent boy" was. He was disturbingly worried that it meant what he thought it did.

"Vampires aren't common here. If people see you they'll be able to catch you. Their technology isn't what you're used to and it will be effective enough the first time."

D was shocked to hear some concern in his father's voice, reminiscent of when he'd been a child and his mother had been alive. It unsettled him enough that he could rethink his options. D didn't like to be in contact with large groups of anything but he wasn't unreasonable. He knew less than nothing about this place, even the architecture was completely alien to him, and there was every chance that his father was telling the truth. If Seras was safe there, if two full-blooded vampires could live with humans, then he wouldn't be anything unusual. They might even be able to help him get back home. If he decided he felt like going home. It wasn't that great a place to live, if he was being honest.

He followed Alucard when he turned away.

-------

The first thing D noticed about Hellsing manor was Seras shooting. Not at him luckily. She was aiming at and hitting targets that were a kilometre in the distance. She still had her assault rifle and he could see its name, Halconnen. He heard Alucard snort derisively. He saw her blonde hair being ruffled by the night air. There was a twinge in his gut and he didn't know whether he was finally feeling compelled to kill her or something else entirely.

"She's improved but she'll be no good against the undead until she drinks."

D started at that. Alucard must have miss-spoken.

"You said she was your… beloved servant." D raised a wry eyebrow at this, fully aware of what happened to most of the women his father had 'beloved'.

"Only one I've ever made."

"So she was human once?" D was slightly disgusted, turned humans were little more than puppets and they were just as weak.

"You surely heard the police girls' confusion over your birth; vampires here are born of the death of virgins." He paused for a moment, his voice remaining as casual as it would when discussing the weather, "except for freaks and princes who lose their faith in God after their armies are massacred by the Turks."

"I'm guessing Seras is the first?" D raised a quizzical eyebrow and Lefty leered quietly.

The change in atmosphere was abrupt.

"Don't you dare even _think_ about it. Even if you ignore the paternal feelings that she inspires in almost all humankind, _I_ wouldn't allow it. She's my servant first and… it would be like fucking your baby sister." Alucard sounded angry but a little surprised too. "Your loving, trusting, devoted, innocent sister that deserves far, far better."

D and Alucard glared at each-other. A long un-needed desire to antagonise authority figures erupted from D's suppressed, teenaged self. Seras wiped her forehead in the background and D could see it from the corner of his eye. She wasn't terrorising humans so he wouldn't have to hunt her. If he wasn't hunting her then he could explore other pastimes, get to know her better. Dracula had never liked the women with whom he was acquainted caring for anyone more than he. The phrase 'Best Friends For Life' floated up from a long unused part of his brain. Sister his _arse_.

He decided it was about time his father paid for five thousand years of parental neglect.

-------

Seras felt a prickle of awareness trickle up her neck. She turned around from shooting targets to see her Master and his son looking in her direction. She blushed under their scrutiny but smiled and waved anyway. Harry stiffened before glancing at Master and then smiling back at her. She thought that was very nice. It would be lovely if she and Harry could be friends.


	4. Chapter Three

**Chapter Three: D causes problems for everyone but Seras.**

Alucard probably wasn't aware of how much Integra knew about his past. She knew that he'd been born Vlad Tepes. That he had been a king who impaled his enemies and lost dramatically to the Turks. She knew that after that loss he had become a consummate monster and made them all pay in his typical fashion. Then he disappeared for a century or so. Integra was beginning to be of the opinion that he'd been able to jump dimensions as Harry had, although his wards limited that now. It was a more logical explanation than any other for his silence during that time. Alucard was many things but quiet had never been one of them. If he had shown any restraint during his un-life he wouldn't have become a servant to the Hellsing family.

Harry further reinforced her convictions. Since Alucard had admitted that the vampire was his son she could only presume that he had, in fact, been born elsewhere. Her ancestor had tested the fecundity of vampires only to discover, much to his relief, that they were barren. Clearly there was a place where this was not so.

Then there were the new monsters to consider... They had never been seen before, nor recorded in the annals of history yet Alucard was aware of them and obviously D was too, if Seras was to be believed. Even her spies at the Vatican had come up short on information. She would have to have words with Lord Horatio about his building violations as well but his reclusive nature and the abandoned state of the property meant it wasn't a priority.

She had to learn more.

As soon as she did she was going to punish Alucard for forcing yet another undead being upon her. A creature that he had no dominion over and that clearly had the people skills of drunken, mute and fire breathing hermit. It was obvious that the boy hadn't been socialised enough as a child. He didn't seem as though he would turn on her straight away but looks could be deceiving. She and Alucard would have to have Words. She decided to have Seras, gentle, kind Seras, show him the ropes. Pip would eat him alive. At least half the geese were going to crack onto him. He really was rather pretty.

Integra did not value prettiness. She didn't think it was particularly useful and things that were not useful annoyed her. She lit her fifth cigar of the evening, a bad sign, and decided that Victoria had been more of a boon than she had previously thought. She was a pretty thing too but she made up for it with her ability to destroy godless hordes and follow orders.

-------

D was feeling very confused. Two women had loudly announced themselves in his presence (he was a quiet bloke, loudness is very relative) and not **one** had been coquettish, lithe and stunningly beautiful. He was currently being stared down by the most butch woman he had ever met, who, like Seras, hadn't gotten any more girlish during her second viewing. She was smoking, for heaven's sake! Smoking and glaring at him with icy nonchalance. _He_ was supposed to be the nonchalant one. It was practically tattooed on his forehead.

While D had an identity crisis, his left hand estimated just how curvy Integra was under her suit. Odds were good that she was toned and blessed with a descent hourglass. Not even Armani could hide those fantastic mammaries. As a parasite (technically _he_ was a mutualistic organism but parasite _sounded_ better), he could understand the desire to appear more intimidating than you naturally did. The outfit just allowed the fluffy exterior to catch up with her internal core of steel. Lefty could empathise but that didn't stop him from wanting to bury his face in her knockers.

The less said about Alucard's thought processes the better. He was like a mathematician, comparing all possible choices to the probability of various consequences and results that could occur. This was inherently useful when he had an order and incredibly dangerous when he didn't. He was likely to react in a way that had a low chance of a positive outcome because he thought it was more interesting. Just to give you an inkling as to what he was up to, he had calculated that there was a probability of 0.001 that Integra's office would catch fire if he kept scuffing his feet on the carpet.

-------

The meeting in Integra's office did not go badly, nor did it go well. D had stared with an unseemly amount of disbelief at his new boss. He'd also been roped into working for her without pay. She, in turn, made it clear that he was less than the dirt (figuratively, Walter had the carpet steam cleaned that morning) beneath her feet. She was sure that he would cause more trouble between her and the other nobility than she deemed practical. One rather heated discussion later and it was discovered that they had very different definitions of what a noble _was_.

The tension had not been aided by Alucard perpetually kicking at the rug.

Eventually Integra dictated that D, another terse conversation had exchanged his preferred name with Harry, would be escorted around the manor post-haste. Just so long as he left her damn office and made himself useful. Alucard became an oppressive force behind him and he realised, quite belatedly, that this woman was his father's Master. How had it come to pass that a human woman was commanding the Lord of all Vampires, the most powerful monster ever to live? Why the hell did he seem to _like_ her bossing him around?

Integra had also told him that the police girl Seras would be 'looking after him'. Alucard did not say anything about this so D just smiled in a slightly antagonistic fashion. He dropped his facial expression when Integra glared at him again.

When Walter offered to show him to the basement, any previous animosity was missing from his manner. D followed, biding his time before confronting anyone about the bizarre rules of this universe. Integra bore careful watching. It was likely that she wasn't human if she had Alucard in her thrall. Either that or Dracula was out seducing human women again. It had happened before.

-------

"Oh, Harry! I'm so _glad_ you're staying. I'm sure you'll like it here."

"Is that a coffin?"

"I'm sorry that we couldn't get you your real one but I'm sure it's comfortable."

"I shall be sleeping in that coffin?"

"Well, obviously. It's not the nicest I've ever seen but it is solid cedar. Mine has this pretty mahogany finish. If it really isn't suitable I can swap with you, until we buy you a permanent one."

"You sleep in a coffin?"

"Master says I have to. Do you not require one?"

"…"

"I heard Master mention that you preferred digging a hole and lying in that."

"…"

"I'll get you a shovel right away."

-------

"Captain, have you seen that new bloke?"

"That's not a bloke, that's a woman."

"Look, just because he walks like a catwalk model and looks just as pretty doesn't make him a girl."

"Face like that hasn't seen the light of testosterone, gotta be a woman."

"Come on Captain, which do you think he is?"

"He's a man, tres belle je sais, mais il est un homme."

"Ahh, Captain, most of us don't speak French."

"I said he's a man, very beautiful but still a man."

"Hah! You owe me ten pounds!"

"And he has his eye on our Seras."

"What?"

"That undead bastard!"

"She's undead too boys, or haven't you noticed those teeth? I'm beginning to think I should be looking for more observant geese, non?"

"Still… She's _Seras_. That's like catching someone making out with your sister."

"Getting caught never used to stop me. He's not used to the game here. Peut-etre I can teach him a thing or two."

-------

"You owe me."

"Yes, my Master."

"I barely manage to get away with Seras. I can't pretend that having another vampire was intentional a _second_ time."

"In my defence, he isn't a full vampire. He _can_ go out in the sun…"

"Hmph, so can you. So could Seras if she chose to drink."

"I haven't seen him in a long time. I will admit that he may act in ways I cannot predict."

"If he harms any of my men I _will_ order you to kill him."

"Yes, my Master."

"Oh, one more thing Alucard…"

"Yes?"

"That does not include him participating in sexual intercourse with them. They need to get out their frustrations somehow."

"…"

"The girls in the tea room have started a pool. They are mostly divided between Seras and Pip, although Pip would probably rather have both of them. I have a not inconsiderable sum riding on that eventuality."

"…"

"Why, Alucard, you look rather red. Perhaps you should go lie down on that bed you've made."

-------

After spending half an hour staring between his new coffin and the hole in the floor, Seras returned. She was smiling the same slightly gormless smile that she'd been wearing since he'd been invited back to the manor. She was still wearing her uniform, made dusty from pulling up stones and digging, and she was carrying some clothes. She put them down on a small desk that resided to his left.

"I managed to borrow some clothes from Gigas. He's about your height and his mum just bought him some new stuff for Christmas so he had spares."

D decided to look at the items with distaste. After a few moments he decided they deserved a little worse than that.

"_This_ is what people wear…? Wait, Gigas?"

"That's just his nickname, his real name is George. Kind of like how your name is Harry but lots of people already call you D." Seras' hands flitted about as she talked, attempting to illustrate her point.

"Do _you_ have a nickname?" D couldn't imagine anything more ignoble than this "nick name" business.

"No, no." She paused and blushed slightly, "Well, Master has a nickname for me that everybody uses but that's mainly because I'm… don't deser… I mean he doesn't think highly of…"

Her shoulders slumped a little and D felt like a bit of a bastard for making her feel bad. It was a novel sensation. A part of him that was very human decided to bail her out.

"I'm not very fond of shortening names," he said before she had a chance to speak further, "Seras is a lovely name, do you mind if I call you by your first name?"

She brightened again and it was like the sun coming out from behind a cloud. "No, not at all."

Seras spent the next ten minutes showing D what she'd brought for him. He preferred his usual clothes but according to her he'd need these if he wanted to go out during the day. That was presuming Lord Hellsing let him go out. Otherwise his leathers would do if he had to fight. She was still _touching_ him a bit more than he was used to but he found himself minding less and less.

As dawn approached Seras started yawning.

"I'm afraid I have to get back to my room now." She mumbled, "I'm useless after the sun rises."

"Thank you for your help."

"Rest for a few hours and then someone will come to show you around. Sleep tight."

"Good morning, Seras."

She'd been slouching toward the door but stopped after he said her name. She turned around, a sleepy grin on her face.

"Thanks Harry."

After she left D realised that he'd just doomed himself to an eternity of being called by his given name. Fuck, he hated his name.


	5. Chapter Four

**Chapter Four: D makes some unwelcome discoveries, as do others.**

James ended up with the job of showing D around Hellsing manor. James was a goose in two senses of the word. A well-meaning sort, he had joined the Geese when he was 19 after he'd been rejected from the army and knocked up his sweetheart, Lily. He thought he was joining an elite branch of the police-force that specialised in hostage situations. It took him four months to realise that they were the ones taking hostages and by then it was too late to leave. He needed as much money as he could get to provide for his now heavily pregnant girlfriend.

Unfortunately for him, just when Tulip was old enough for day-care and a week before his spouse was ready to go back to work, she discovered that she was again with child. They got married that time. It quickly became obvious that childcare for two was very expensive and it was easier for Lily to stay home, since her salary was less than his and she wanted to. James was stuck with being a mercenary until little Johnny turned three and went to preschool. He'd been counting down the days to this event when an evening without the kids and too much vodka ensured that Lily was again impregnated.

James had almost been at the point where he could convince himself that the work wasn't too bad, really, and it did give him hours conducive to the challenges of raising children. Almost. He'd probably have made it if D had stopped glaring at him for a minute.

You see, it seemed D did not suffer fools gladly. James, for all his many positive attributes, had an aura of ineptitude that affected everything he touched. They had already seen the entrance hall four times as a result of James' poor planning skills. They'd passed Seras' room fifteen times, although he wasn't sure how that had happened. After the third time D had gone very quiet, the kind of quiet that only comes before a horrible storm, and Alucard had showed up in front of her door glaring. The glaring had turned into hissing and then D had started snarling back. Eventually their Mexican standoff dissolved into a verbal brawl with Alucard pointing towards his servant's door and D gesticulating wildly at _him_.

And then both of them turned their undivided attention towards James.

"I love my wife and children and if I died my insurance wouldn't be enough to care for them and I'm sure that at least one of them would end up selling themselves on a street corner just to make rent." He thought that someone should be aware of that.

"What?" The two men had identical, incredulous sneers.

"If I name my unborn child after you will you promise not to kill me?"

-------

So it came to pass that Alucard begrudgingly gave D a tour and James escaped with his life.

"I hate you, father." D wasn't particularly happy about it either.

"I'm contractually obliged not to loathe you but I'm pretty unhappy with you too _Harold._"

"_Don't_ call me Harold."

"It's your name." Alucard huffed petulantly, "I can't believe you're sniffing after a little girl."

"She's better company than you, _Dad_," D sneered, "Mum was just a year older than Seras when _you_ started seeing her, she told me."

"_I_ was younger then, you must be five hundred years old by now."

D stared at him for a moment, "What?"

"I came back here sometime during the sixteenth century and well after you were born; it's now approaching the second millennium."

"Father, it's been… thousands of years since you disappeared." D's voice trailed away into nothing.

Alucard's shoulders clenched and his mouth opened shortly, fangs bared for all to see. His gloved hands tightened into fists. D was more staid in appearance but his eyes kept darting around his father's face. His left hand was wisely silent. Beneath his red glasses Alucard's eyes drifted closed.

"What year is it?"

"Sometime in the twelfth millennia, not absolutely sure when."

"I've been gone that long…"

Alucard turned towards his son. D flinched under his scrutiny. The now apparently younger vampire took his son by the chin and looked over his face carefully. The gesture seemed familiar to D and oddly comforting.

"I had hoped for better for you."

D hadn't been expecting his father to sound sad. He'd been expecting him to get angry and a little indignant at having his son be older. His unexpected brittleness was unnerving even as it was touching. Alucard's hands slid into his pockets in a surprisingly human gesture.

"I was hoping that you'd age eventually, most damphires do after a dozen centuries or so."

"Why?"

"Surely you know by now what this life is like." Alucard paused, lips pursed for a moment, "You were never human though so I suppose you can't feel the difference in your bones."

"What do you mean?"

"The police girl _chose_; she knew what she was stepping into. Vampires of the frontier are born with others to share eternity with. I was hoping that your life would be finite, that you would be the man and not the monster."

"I'm not a monster." D bristled at this casual defamation of his character, his earlier goodwill evaporating like ethanol.

"Like it or not that's what we are. Men die, monsters endure." Alucard pulled a hand away from his coat and pushed his glasses further up his nose. A piece of folded paper fell from his pocket.

Alucard moved towards a window, so D retrieved it in his stead. It had the word Victoria written across it in flowing copperplate.

"What's this?"

Alucard turned and started slightly. He reached for the missive and D gave it back without conflict. Their conversation was leaving him drained, angry but surprisingly non-combative.

"This is for the police girl, but not yet." D let it go.

"Is 'Police girl' a nickname or a title?"

"Both."

D frowned, "Well you shouldn't call her that, it upsets her."

Then D turned away from his father, missing his look of exasperation. D felt defeated and unbeknownst to him Alucard too felt as though he had lost.

-------

Seras was even more embarrassed than usual. This took effort on the part of her team mates but they all agreed it was worth it to see her blush. Seras herself wasn't even sure why she spent so much time hanging out with them after training exercises. Perhaps she had been hoping that as time passed she'd be promoted from her position as mascot. It seemed that no matter where she was or what state she was in, the police force or the army, alive or dead, that she was just too pathetic to be taken seriously. If Seras had higher self-esteem she'd have realised that the Geese liked teasing her because she was younger than them (even if she was immortal) and because that was the only way that they could indicate fondness without sacrificing manliness.

"Seras likes D-eee, Seras likes D-eee!"

"Shut up, you guys!"

Of course, their behaviour could also be considered immature, classroom behaviour akin to dipping girls' pigtails in ink. Pip was one of the few that knew what hazing was, he just didn't care. Everyone knew that all the pointy teeth in the world couldn't make the police girl a threat to them. She was their girl-next-door/sex symbol/soft target and most of them were absolutely in love with her. They were just lucky that they hadn't said anything to truly hurt her feelings yet.

"Hey, we didn't know you were a lesbian!"

"Steady on, mate."

"Fellas, he's Master's son. I'm not about to _do_ anything with him."

"Would you do anything if he _wasn't?_"

"I, uh…"

"He sure does look like Alucard."

"Pff, if Alucard was a woman."

A hush descended.

"Don't talk about my Master like that, that's not on."

Somebody coughed.

"So apparently most of you are spell-bound by the thought of Alucard if 'e was a woman." Pip leered, "Interesting."

The silence was broken by cries and the thumps of several water-bottles being thrown at Pip's head. All of them missed.

"Seras, you 'ave been very nice to this new boy; how come you are never so nice to me, eh?"

"I'm very nice to you!"

The entire squad simultaneously coughed and it sounded very much like 'wall'.

"Hey, I only did that once… and you know I'm not like that! Harry's very courteous to me and I want him to feel welcome. I think it's nice he's getting to see his Dad again after so long," Seras' voice cracked almost imperceptibly, _almost,_ "I'm very happy for him and Master."

The Geese had an interesting reputation, mainly propagated by themselves, but they deserved it. They didn't start working for Hellsing until they had a list of and information on everyone that worked there. They added Seras the minute they found out about her. Everybody but James knew that her parents had died horribly (they'd elected not to tell him because he wouldn't have reacted well to stories of families being massacred during the night). They also confirmed that she and all her friends within the police force were dead. Knowing this they all realised that they should have left the issue well enough alone. Not entirely alone, mind, that would be suspicious, just alone _enough_.

Seras' father had been a good cop and that actually counted for something in the Geese. She'd clearly spent most of her life emulating him. The mood sufficiently broken, Seras quickly took her leave bubbling admirably and missed the disappointed and sheepish faces of that the men were making. As she walked from the barracks to the manor, dragging her feet, she heard jogging coming from behind her. Soon she was shoulder to shoulder with her commander, who was loping casually beside her as though he'd always been there.

"We're just joshing, Seras."

She smiled and nodded but her shoulders remained slumped.

"Hey, Seras, close your eyes."

This time she blushed and brought a hand up to guard her mouth. "No, I'm not falling for that trick. That only works when you catch me off guard." It had been effective no less than seven times while on missions and at least twice during training manoeuvres.

"Seras Victoria, close your eyes." He switched into his combat voice and Seras' feet snapped together as quickly as her eyelids, even though she managed to keep her hand over her lips.

She felt an arm wrap around her and a chin rest itself on top of her head.

"Chin up, Seras, I'm proud of you."

She leant into him slightly and smiled. Then she blushed profusely and walked back to her room as quickly as propriety would allow. Pip watched her go and laughed to himself. He didn't laugh at her though, he never did that.

-------

Walter was perturbed. It took a lot to perturb the old man; usually he had to be facing vampiric Nazis with two broken hands and armed with only a guitar string before he even broke a sweat. Today was different however because he had noticed something that nobody else had. He _always_ worried when he made an unwelcome discovery. Nobody liked a Cassandra. It didn't help that what he had seen made their new guest a potential threat.

The thing about Alucard was that he was a bastard. The thing about Seras was that she loved her master. She loved him so much that she'd run after whenever he went off half cocked. If he jumped into a pool of holy water with Alexander Anderson, she'd be diving after him with spare clips of ammo and a knife between her teeth. Alucard did something cool and self-destructive, Seras tried to help him as much as she could. She was no shrinking violet, she was damage control armed with an uzi.

So he had not believed his eyes when she _hadn't_ dived after him when he'd fought D. They had both been in far more serious scrapes and she had intervened in ones that were less serious. It had seemed as though something was holding her back. She had looked almost dazed. If she took a step forward, D would look at her and every time she'd reluctantly step back. If the fight had gone on for more than a few minutes she'd have eaten her own lip.

What he did not know was that D's left hand had noticed as well and he was far less careful with how he used the information.


	6. Chapter Five

**Chapter Five: D makes even more unwelcome discoveries and then plays a game.**

Harry and Alucard spent the next five weeks avoiding each-other. Their juvenile behaviour would have been amusing had they not left Seras feeling so queasy. She could hardly be in the same room as both them. Soon Seras started avoiding seeing them concurrently. Either separately was fine but when one came within a hundred metres of the other her temples would start to throb and she'd take leave of whatever company she was keeping and head for the hills. She only wished that she was like normal people that got pains in their knees when something bad was approaching. Of course she'd be the only person in the world with a gammy _head_. The tension was not aided by the sudden disappearance of the DRBs (the new, colloquial name for dimension-ripping beasts). No one knew what had brought them to England; much less what had made them leave. Even Harry was perplexed by their behaviour.

When she wasn't hiding from familial conflict, she was introducing Harry to army hierarchy. Being technically dead meant that you had no rank. Being able to crush stone walls with your bare hands meant that most people knew better than to actually pull it on you.

After a particularly scary demonstration on Seras' part, one that left Harry and half of London shaken, it was discovered that he simply wasn't as strong as she was. They had to find other means of scaring people into submission.

"I had to fling Pip into a wall in the beginning." Explained Seras, "He kept laughing at me, you see."

"Do they take you seriously now?"

"They know I don't want to hurt them. If you _pretend_ you don't care though that might hold them off… Are you choking?"

Having a strategy is not the same as implementing it. Seras didn't know how to introduce Harry to the Geese in an environment that would foster some mutual admiration while avoiding a violent brawl. Harry wasn't going to like being "initiated" into the group. Being of the fairer sex was all that had saved Seras from being tarred and feathered.

Seras _had_ known that it would be a bad idea to tell Harry about the war games. She hadn't meant to but it slipped out when he'd asked about what her plans were for the evening. He was so polite that she always felt compelled to answer him. It was quite similar to the way Pip could always get her to close her eyes by sounding like a real C.O. Seras had been taught two things very well in her lifetime, to be polite and do what senior officers told her. The former was learned from her parents and the latter from Sergeant Rebus, the one man to never stare at her breasts.

The war games weren't the kind that involved little painted soldiers and a table top that resembled forest terrain. They were the kind that involved live ammunition, full combat gear and two opposing forces that comprised of the Geese on one team and Seras on the other armed with a switchblade. She even won half the time. Seras wasn't sure that Harry would take to it too well and she wasn't sure she liked it overmuch herself. Pip thought it was hilarious, of course.

"Harry, I don't think you want to get involved in this, it's very boring." Seras tried to sound as nonchalant as she could. In her defence it wasn't something that came naturally to her.

"No… Alucard was right." Harry had started checking his gear the moment after Seras let slip about their practice battles, "I don't know how people fight here and I need to learn."

"The Geese are human but they're good. They shoot to kill; I just learned how to dodge after the first time…"

"Bullets are fine."

"Well, I will admit that they aren't blessed silver but they'll still cause a dent," Seras paused, "and you don't drink blood either so you'll take forever to heal."

"Why blessed silver?"

"It's deadly to vampires, didn't you know?"

D flinched and stopped tying his boot laces.

"Didn't know what?"

"Harry, you hunt vampires and you don't know that silver hurts them? The last time I… God it was horrible, you're just lucky you had decent armour on when Master shot you." Seras paused thoughtfully, "That stuff about garlic is all bollocks but most of the rest is pretty true."

"No… garlic worked once. Wait, what are we talking about?" It seemed Seras thought leather was far tougher than it looked, it would explain why she hadn't seemed concerned over his health that night, though.

D was beginning to look a little greyer than usual. Seras wasn't sure why but she felt compelled to continue humouring his odd line of questioning.

"We're talking about things that are deadly to vampires, like certain metals, certain shapes…."

"Shapes, what shapes?"

"Like a cross."

Recognition flared in his eyes before confusion set in again. He clenched his fists in frustration.

"Keep talking."

"Harry, you don't look well, I think going out tonight is a bad idea…"

"No, I'm fine." His eyes glazed and then he twitched, teeth lengthening painfully, "Just… fine."

"Harry, tell me what's happening here." She wasn't asking.

D placed a hand over his mouth, willing it back into its normal shape. His left hand was gabbering illegibly at him.

"I don't know."

-------

D didn't know how he convinced Seras to let him go and train with the Geese after his outburst. He'd been told that he'd have to talk to Alucard about his memory problems later but he couldn't remember what he was forgetting. It was all terribly confusing. Luckily it seemed that D was good at ignoring his problem because he already didn't know what it was.

-------

Pip knew Christmas had come early when Seras showed up to fight night with D in tow. The kid was probably older than he looked but that didn't stop him being the definitive emo-twink. In Pip's experience the more weapons and the more effort put into appearance, the shorter the tussle. D was wearing the leathers he'd arrived in, bullet holes patched invisibly. Come to think of it, how had he survived that? It probably had something to do with being the spawn of Alucard; he made it easy to suspend disbelief indefinitely.

"Captain, D wanted to join in tonight so he could get a feel for the weapons we use." Seras was using her professional voice, the one that graciously implied that there would grievous consequences should you not respond in an appropriate way.

"That is an excellent idea Seras; he can go on your team."

"We'll be blue this time."

"Sounds like a plan." Pip lit a cigarette and gave D the eye. "We'll get started in ten."

"See you on the flipside, sir." Seras took D by the arm as she walked to her end of the grounds. D turned back to glare quizzically before he was out of sight.

Pip admired Seras' butt during that time. When he couldn't see it he thought about it. He may have been prepping his team on the outside but on the inside it was all about the police girl. Comparing parts of her anatomy to D's was also quite diverting while he waited for their downtime to completely elapse. After that he thought about hunting down the scum-sucking enemy blue team.

-------

Seras took the time she had telling D about the playing field. Hellsing Manor was conveniently located next to some open woodland and not much else. A high voltage fence kept civilians out so it was a perfect place to practice high-stakes combat. There was a small lake towards the western edge of the forest but otherwise the area was fairly flat. If you wanted to get to some high ground you had to climb a tree. Seras had to explain that climbing was a bad idea though because it reduced your manoeuvrability and because the Geese knew to look above their own height.

Seras' watch chirped when it was time to go. She tapped it and it fell silent.

"I'll take point; you watch my back, ditch the cape here." Seras' voice gained a different quality, a certain coarseness that faded on her off-duty hours. By the time D realised this Seras was already striding into the undergrowth.

D jogged lightly to catch up, draping his cloak on a tree branch as he went. He drew out a knife as an afterthought.

"So, how do we decide who wins."

"When the other team is all dead."

"They die?" Seras sounded far too serious for comfort.

"You go through the motions, if you slit their throat you keep the knife a centimetre away and they know they're out." Seras's voice took on a sagely tone, "We're very fond of realistic simulations."

"What about you?"

"Oh, they shoot me near the heart. Quiet now."

D was beginning to feel like he'd stumbled into a madhouse again. It seemed like every town he walked into, no matter how picturesque, was filled with such nuthouses. Seras began to speed up and D actually had to focus on keeping up with her. The Geese were at the other side of the wood but he could still hear them, slightly. They were keeping quiet. Seras stopped him from walking up to them.

"They'll have a sniper nearby, they're trying to get us on open ground." Seras scanned the shrub land. "Pip's trying to cut us off too, someone's circling in behind."

D hadn't heard anyone but he took her word for it. She started moving east, closer to Hellsing and the quieter Geese. She made some sharp movements with her hands that D took mean, "You jump in front and surprise them while I pick them off at the back." Seras disappeared into the trees and D was alone. He shifted his weight as carefully as possible, he was as silent as a grave on a good day but these humans seemed to be giving him a run for his money. Perhaps they had superior hearing too. He consulted with lefty while he walked.

"I need some help."

"Oh, now you feel like talking." D could feel his left hand sneering. "You've been ignoring me in favour of that vampire girl for over a _month._"

"I need to know if you can tell me how many there are. I think they're using something to muffle their footsteps."

"Yeah, they are. It's called skill."

"Can I at least use you to scare them?"

"What am I, just another ugly appendage? I'll help you look but that's it."

D took this small capitulation and ran with it. His hand preceded him wherever he went. He attempted to follow Seras' directions through the unfamiliar terrain. The tree weren't the kind he was used to. The bark was darker and they seemed to drop more branches. He still treaded lightly and kept quiet but it took him more effort. The wind wasn't helping things either. The sound of the leaves rustling might have covered any slip-ups from the opposition.

"I see them." Lefty grunted and D felt more than he heard the vibration. "They're about a hundred metres ahead, five men, all heavily armoured."

He was only supposed to surprise them and even if they did fight he couldn't aim to kill. D wasn't used to playing like this. He figured if he started out with a ranged weapon he might be able to knock a few down and then rely on his speed. He brushed his thighs to shake off some dirt and pricked his pinky on a wooden dart.

D smiled like an evil thing.

-------

James liked walking through the woods at night. It was very soothing. Even when he was in his riot gear and about to shoot at one of his friends, the one that had bought those cute little booties for Tulip when she'd turned one, it was still soothing. Pip had warned their team that D was joining in this time but he wasn't worried. He usually died within twenty minutes, which was fairly disturbing, really but it meant he could be home before eight. Fight night always meant he could tuck the kids in at bedtime and maybe read a story.

James resisted the urge to hum. He felt someone tap his shoulder. Nobody was there. He looked to his right and saw Sam appearing confused as well. He had something sticking out of his flak jacket. James felt around his own neck and found a skewer, uncomfortably close to his neck. He cupped a hand to his mouth and whispered as softly as he could.

"Hey Sam, I think we're dead." Sam frowned at him.

"Crap."

The inky black shadows behind them warped into a young man. He sauntered past them, tipping his hat in greeting and smiling all the while. Since they were dead they couldn't warn their team-mates. They watched silently as he "slit" Dean's throat and "stabbed" Winchester, an _ex-marine_, in the back. Seras appeared ahead and took down Joe, just as he was turning toward D, by pretending to snap his neck. When she determined that all of them were out she twisted and glared at the other vampire.

"I told you to come in from the front."

James thought that the ensuing domestic was quite similar to those he had with his wife. He'd do something that was technically good and then get lectured for half an hour on how much he'd disrupted his wife's plans. The worst part was that she always right. The newly deceased men made their getaway as quickly as possible, completely reluctant to get involved on his behalf.

"You know, I think we ought to buy that man a drink." Dean winced in sympathy.

James took five quid from his pocket and handed it to him.

"Buy him a pint for me, I have to get home to the wife and kids."

The other guys smiled and rolled their eyes. For all of James' many faults he was a good mate, a loving husband and a wonderful Dad. It wasn't so bad having him around.

-------

Men were being picked off left, right and centre. Clearly their ambush had failed and he knew that their sniper had been eliminated. He kept seeing flashes of yellow in his peripheral vision and he was fairly sure that something was moving ahead of him, out of sight. He could only see nine of his side still standing. He ducked into the undergrowth, twigs not bothering him beneath all the Kevlar and thick cloth. He pulled out his rifle and waited for movement. Seras usually made a bull-rush when there were only a few of them left. He hoped to catch her before she scattered them.

Two muffled thumps meant seven left.

Robson moved forward into his line of sight, scouting as much as he could in the poor light. The quality of the shadows behind him changed. Pip fired on reflex and hit D in the shoulder. The man didn't even slow. He took Robson with a knife before wheeling. Norris had started to run towards him. The pale man kicked high, stoping just short of the other's neck. Pip fired again, hitting him in the chest this time. Then he felt a cold barrel pressed against his neck.

Seras glared at him. She'd taken down five people while he'd been distracted.

He smiled winningly back at her.

"You're beautiful in your wrath."

Seras smiled and laughed, a tinkling sound that was pleasantly at odds with the rest of her.

"Thank you, Captain."


	7. Chapter Six

**Chapter Six: D isn't the focus if you squint:**

She'd been reading so long that the print had started to blur. It was a complete bitch reading twelve type Times New Roman when you'd been at it six hours. She couldn't even rely on cigars anymore because she could no longer taste them. Her mouth felt like a canyon. She pushed her glasses up and rubbed at her eyes. She heard someone knocking on the heavy wood of her office door. She tilted her head back, sighed and then righted herself.

"Come in." She looked human by the time the door was open. It was one of the younger secretaries.

"This note just came from Captain Bernadotte, Ma'am." The girl was fairly fresh out of high school, attractive but a bit of a dreamer.

"Thank you Sarah." She flushed, pleased that Integra had remembered her name.

The silly chit didn't know that Integra remembered everybody's names. It was her business to know. She even knew that the girl was crushing madly on one of the Geese, a womaniser called Jareth. The only thing that had stopped him sleeping through the typing pool was Walter. Walter didn't approve of ungentlemanly behaviour.

Although, from the way the girl kept mooning over the men in uniform, perhaps _she_ did.

Sarah left quietly and Integra was left with Pip's missive. It was slightly more colourful than usual.

_Sir Hellsing,_

_Seras included D in tonight's war game. He doesn't follow orders too well. I've been told Seras had to take him down a peg or two and did it in front of five other guys. They're trying to get him pissed as we speak so they're either ok with him or they're hoping to get laid. Maybe getting henpecked and plastered will get him to tow line more. In any case he can tag along with us the next time we go out. That stick up his ass doesn't slow him down too much. _

_Oh yes, you and I won the betting pool again. Seras was the only survivor and she took me down with a bullet in the brainpan. Squish. D took two hits before he was out. Might want to remember that for future rounds, hey?_

_Well, I have to go and try hopelessly to get Seras to love me. Her tits look fantastic tonight, don't tell Alucard. _

_With great dedication,_

_Pip Bernadotte (Sex God)_

Integra didn't know why she let Pip get away with his unique brand of information trading. She thought it might have something to do with how much money they won collectively on office gambling. She was slightly worried that it meant she was going slowly mad. Not enough to stop. She needed something more than Alexander Anderson breaking up the boredom of bureaucracy.

The door opened again and Integra ignored it. There was only one person that was actually allowed to enter without express permission. Walter put down a cup of tea next her paperwork. A strange impulse compelled her to raise her head and look at the man. He'd been with Hellsing since long before she'd been born. He was like part of the woodwork. He was probably the only member of staff that she didn't keep close tabs on. He smiled and bowed politely, then turned to leave.

"Walter?" Integra almost felt a younger version of herself speak but knew he wouldn't hold it against her.

"Yes ma'am?"

"You know, I don't think I ever thank you enough for all the work you do in this madhouse." Integra rested her chin against her steepled hands. "I don't know what I'd do without you."

Walter stiffened perceptibly and Integra realised that her impetuous sentimentality probably meant a lot to him. It was interesting that she was so perceptive, yet had missed such a simple thing. Strange when you thought about it. She didn't know it but the wheels of fate were spun on such small observations. Integra didn't believe in all that crap. If she'd been feeling more philosophical she might have noticed that ignoring a good employee might bite you in the ass later. She wasn't, so none of it matters much.

"Thank you, ma'am." Walter bowed politely. "I have something I would like to discuss with you, if you have a moment."

Elsewhere the wine was flowing.

-------

It took Pip a good half hour to convince Seras to drink vodka. Since becoming a reluctant blood-drinker it seemed that she couldn't eat food. She refused to even try. Vodka wasn't food though and if Seras had chosen to bite any of the men in her company at that present moment ("Hypothetically Seras, I meant hypothetically!") she'd have been ingesting a great deal of it along with their red stuff. So that meant that vodka was ok and didn't count as a food because it could be present in blood.

"Oh, I guess that's alright then. Wait, what did I just agree to?"

Seras was no match for flawed logic.

D was already participating in a drinking competition in the corner with Jareth. Jareth fortunately lacked D's constitution so it was doubtful that his virtue would be compromised. Sam, Dean and Winchester kept egging them on, even as Jareth tipped alarmingly off his seat and hit the dirty floor with a loud thump. The three men paused and then kept shouting.

"Scull! Scull! Scull!"

"Shut up, would you." D downed another shot. "You wouldn't last a minute out on the frontier."

"What, with cowboys and Indians?"

"What is an Indian? We've only got werewolves and shit." It seemed that hard liquor made D's vocab a lot more fun.

Seras sipped at her vodka cruiser. When the first was gone Pip bought her another. Then he bought himself three fingers of whiskey for courage. Things pretty much degenerated from there.

"Hey, how did we end up in the tower of London?" Seras drunkenly leaned on an equally pissed Pip.

"I can see my house from here!" Dean said whilst precariously leaning over a stone ledge.

D was walking on top of the battlements, bobbing up and down with the geometric pattern of the blocks. Jareth had passed out on the way in but Winchester was just managing to keep up with him.

"Sheras, Cherie, Sheras, you're gorgeoush, you do know you're gorgeoush?"

Pip tripped over one of the bottles that Winchester had dropped, taking himself and Seras out in the process. Seras started to laugh louder than was appropriate. The she and Pip started shushing each-other, index fingers wavering across their noses. D ran past them again and Winchester jumped over their legs.

"Not gorgeous, just have big tits," Seras used her hands to demonstrate, "S'only reason why anybody ever talks to me."

Sam was slightly less drunk but was still watching them both with his mouth open. Seras certainly did have fantastic breasts. He had to lean against a wall so he could truly appreciate their magnitude and unrealistic perkiness. D was running back along the wall again with Winchester still hot on his heels. He caught his left boot on Sam's elbow and went sailing over the side.

"You motherfucker!" he yelled on the way down.

Pip and Seras fell over each-other in their haste to stand up again. Then they fell over Winchester who had kept running for a little while and had to double back. Then they looked down towards D. He was lying on the ground.

"I'm ok!" he gave them a thumb up.

They had to remind Seras to use the stairs before she went down to check on him.

"I'm walking you home D, you'f had enough." Seras pulled D to his feet like she was hauling a rag-doll, "Home it ish."

Pip staggered behind and the others remained to pick up all the weapons they'd left scattered all over the place.

-------

You may remember that Lefty knew D had some power of persuasion over Seras. What you may not know is that D is usually aware of what Lefty was doing at any given time. Except for when he's not in complete control of all his mental faculties, such as one is when under the influence of alcohol.

Yes, Oh dear indeed.

-------

Left-hand was feeling slightly disgruntled. D was still ignoring him even more than usual, all because he'd made some new human friends. Damn human lover. He didn't even have Seras to entertain him because D had him clutching her shoulder. When she did come into view all he could see was her back. Her uniform-clad back that only had a waist to entertain him and no other curvy bits what-so-ever. He started to huff, bored out of his wits.

"I wish you'd turn around, Seras."

D lurched suddenly and then lefty had a face full of Seras' shirt. She started jabbering and D responded colourlessly. He couldn't hear them through the fabric but he could feel softness underneath him. Hel_lo_, there. It seemed that a drunken D gave over more control to his technically-parasitic body buddy. It was hardly surprising that D could exert influence given his relationship to her sire. That he had some power though... power in excess of making sarcastic remarks, eating things and embarrassing D…

Now _that_ was an excellent idea.

-------

Seras must have been more legless than Pip had originally thought. She was acting weird, turning around at odd moments, skipping or hopping. She'd even spun on her heels at one point and almost run into _him_. She'd looked as confused as all hell too. She'd even started stuttering apologies and the shutting up before she'd completed them. If she blushed any more he thought her head would explode. By the time they entered the Hellsing mansion again she was clutching at her shirt and shivering like mad. Pip and D were trying to hold her up at that stage.

D was looking worried that she'd been possessed or poisoned.

"Serash, is anything wrong, Cherie?" Pip waved a hand in front of her eyes.

She flinched as D extended an arm towards her. When she turned her head toward him, body firmly in the opposite direction, her eyes were almost entirely black. D smoothed his hand along her shoulder, looking more closely at her face. Pip followed suit. She flushed even harder under their scrutiny. She wasn't foaming at the mouth, her skin held no burst capillaries or unusual discolouration. As Pip fought to focus his attention he thought he heard mumbling.

"Take off your shirt. Come on, do it. Take it off."

-------

D started to clench his hand but it was too late. Seras went rigid and pressed her fingers between the buttons of her shirt. After that she pulled. D decided to stop paying attention to her clothes because it was likely to make her angry in the future. He heard, rather than saw, buttons hitting the floor. Seras softened and then looked down. Pip started muttering praise and obscenities in French. Although he was trying not look, D could see her magnificent bosom in his peripheral vision. Blood that didn't move much was starting to flow again. For some reason it allowed his head to clear enough for a few un-slurred words to make their way into open air.

"You parasitic son of a bitch, stop whatever the hell it is you are doing _right now_."

Left hand started sniggering. Seras shifted her focus back to him and her chest began to heave. Her lips drew together and her brows furrowed. She crossed her arms across her chest, pushing her breasts higher. Seras started to sway. Pip was trying to steady her but she kept shrugging him off. D backed up slightly as a sudden light entered her eyes. He had seen that expression on the faces of many a female that had desired him. It scared the shit out of him.

His left hand would not stop giggling.

-------

Seras felt out of sorts. Normally she avoided men, as much as one could in a male dominated profession. She wasn't comfortable with sex. Sex. Funny word. She could barely think it without blushing. Strange thoughts were filtering into her head and they sounded old. It was like dust was settling over her brain. Oldy, mouldy, dusty dust.

"Pip, Harry, I feel sick."

"Oh look," said a voice unlike her own, "D is standing right over there."

D? Wait, _Harry_, why was she doing this to Har…

Oh, oh, D! D who looked so much like her master, master's estranged son. He was really tall and she told him so. Much taller than her and she was also tall. She leant into his chest and used her hand to mark her height. She came up to his clavicles. They were so sharply defined that she could run her finger up and down them. Up and down, up and down.

D pushed her away gently and she swooned. It was like walking through water. Normally she was really coordinated. She could run and carry heavy things and catch things and… Her head hurt. D had cold skin. Seras pressed her aching forehead against his chest with a sigh of relief. That felt better, her headache was gone. D moved backwards again and Seras followed, just so it wouldn't hurt so badly. If she kissed him would it stop hurting forever? Something told her that it would.

She thought she could hear something within the background noise.

"_Give me a knife,"_

"_What? What are you doing to her?"_

"_Not me doing it."_

D wrapped his arms around her. He had something in his right hand.

"Don't panic, Seras."

"Do you have cotton in your mouth? You sound so far awaaaaayyyy." Words slurred and her mouth stopped working too well.

D made a jerking motion that pushed his elbows into her sides. Seras' vision cleared.

She was clutching her Master's son and she was topless. In front of Pip. Topless.

Oh God.

Harry's left hand was bleeding profusely.

-------

When Alucard heard Seras scream like a bansidhe he went to her side immediately. The first thing he noticed was the smell of alcohol. The second was Seras' state of undress. The third was D and all of his blood on the hardwood. Pip kept getting in the way of him noticing these things.

"Get out, Police Girl."

Seras didn't hear him the first time; she just clutched at her head and cried out weakly. Pip put an arm around her but kept his eyes hardened on her Master. D pulled an army blade from his hand and threw it on the floor.

"I told you to get out of this room, Seras." This time her glassy eyes swivelled towards him.

"Yes Master." The sound was broken.

Pip helped drag her out of the room. Alucard turned his attention towards his son.

"I am going to kill you," he said, "With my bare hands."

"Can you wait until I stop vomiting?" D said and then emptied his stomach all over his father's shoes.


	8. Chapter Seven

**Chapter Seven: D suffers the consequences.**

Alucard waited in the eye of the storm for roughly twenty minutes. D spent most of that time bleeding and hurling onto the floor, making futile attempts to push his hair out of his face. Alucard bent his knees, back ramrod straight, so he could straighten his son's back. He made some small soothing circles while he was there. As soon as D had reached the stage of sitting unaided, he launched himself back into the violent maelstrom of his rage.

He started by removing his glasses.

"How dare you." Alucard's eyes were red like the fires of hell, "Even I never, would never…"

"It wasn't my fault." He mustered his strength enough to glare, "And you have done worse, I've had to hunt down the people you screwed with. I'd never purposely hurt her."

"What the fuck do you mean? You piece of shit, you were inside her _head_."

"Look at my hand." D sounded tense, pained. "Does this even sound like something _I_ would do?"

"You hate me so much that you would _ruin_ her?"

"I can't control vampires, even with blood, even if I could create one." D thrust his left hand into Alucard's face. "You _know _what I am."

Alucard did not calm down. "Seras is far beyond his powers, not yours."

Lefty groaned, weakly. He mewled words about blood while his eyes rolled precariously inside their sockets. Every vampire worth his salt knew the power of blood. It gave you strength, allowed you to strengthen others. Blood was memory and power, it carried.

"He used you as a conduit." Realisation dawned and it didn't rise happily, either. After all, Alucard had been the one to place the creature inside his son's hand in the first place.

Alucard grabbed Lefty with his right hand and dragged his fingers into the creature's eyes with the other. Then he twisted. Both monsters howled from the unexpected pain. Alucard ignored his son's writhing and pushed his face towards that of the parasite. So close that the creature could hear hounds in the distance.

"If you ever try to assault my servant again I will end you, regardless of the cost."

Alucard released his grip and D fell, clutching agonisingly at his broken appendage. For the first time in eons D cried out, twitching and slack jawed. His teeth grew and he bit his tongue. He thrashed. More blood hit the floor, melding with the black fluid that dripped from Lefty's eyes. The no-life king was unmoved. He watched until D quieted and then he spoke.

"We are going to talk."

-------

It took D ten minutes to stop screaming on the outside. He didn't think he'd ever stop the sounds within his head.

"You have power over my servant."

D stared at him, face grey and drawn. Even when he'd been a child he'd never been afraid of the man. Now he wasn't sure that he'd ever turn his back on him again. Lefty still wasn't talking, he could barely even cry anymore.

"Did you not hear me?"

"I heard you." D croaked, voice still sore from shouting.

"Go to your coffin, Alucard." Integra's voice rose icy and unexpected from the central stairs. "You have done more than enough for one evening."

"Master, I have need for further discussion with my son."

"I said that you have done more than enough for one evening." She descended with her head held high, "We will talk more on this later."

Walter appeared from nowhere and slung D's arm around his shoulder. Alucard looked towards the two for a short moment, before disappearing into the floor. D slumped in relief.

"Take him to the basement, Walter. You know which room."

"Are you sure ma'am?"

"Of course," She shifted her eyes towards D, "You were doing well for a while there."

"Nothing good lasts forever." The words sounded as though they had been dragged through sand paper.

"I take it you didn't notice the sway you had." Her voice was not as cold as it had been.

"If I had I would have left already."

"I suppose you would have."

"Do you know if Seras will be alright?" D raised his head to ask her, "I'm not entirely sure about what he did to her."

"We might have been able to avoid this had anyone told me about your… symbiote earlier."

D had no reply to give.

"When I know anything I will tell you."

Walter took D away.

Integra leant against the banister and allowed her head to drop. She gave herself a minute to feel incredulous and a little sorry for herself. She had to do it every now and again to prevent herself from snapping. The minute ended. Integra started internally cataloguing her losses.

Integra was now down a vampire and wouldn't have use of a large portion of her soldiers until they had sobered up. Most of the men were off duty and had returned to their homes even if they were not inebriated. She had survived with less before during a catastrophe. She wouldn't be able to rely on them all arriving quickly if she called them. If someone cut off communications, as had happened before, it would become a moot point.

There was also Seras to consider on a personal level. Her experience and D's involvement would be enough to cause dissension among the ranks. They would become sloppy, she knew that from experience. She was now well and truly on the testing field. If they were lucky no harm would come of it. Integra did not rely on luck though because she had never really had any.

Integra looked at her shoes and grimaced.

"Now who's going to clean all this up?"

-------

At least the cell had a bed in it. D fell onto the old bunk and folded into himself. He had never hurt like this before. He always healed. He'd have enlisted Lefty's help but he didn't think that either of them deserved the respite. He didn't have enough elements for regeneration in any case, judging by how badly he felt.

What on earth had happened to him? Just weeks ago he'd been a one man army. He'd spent half his time jumping over people towards hideous monsters while being likened to a mystic bird. Now he was in a room he wasn't even sure he could get out of. He never should have gone out for drinks in the first place. Even if it had been a novel idea at the time. He should have known better…

He'd been getting used to be treated like a person again. He didn't like the wolf whistles and the staring but the Geese did that to almost everyone. Nobody here was scared of him or in awe of him. People were mocking him good-naturedly and sexual assault didn't seem so rampant. The there was Lefty to consider. They'd been constant companions since D's birth. They were family if only because they were stuck together even if they hated each-other. Family wasn't supposed to fuck around with family in any sense, be it metaphorical or literal. Fighting was fine, having funny feelings about your cousin was expected but psychically controlling your sexy pseudo-maybe-adoptive-if-you-were-stretching-it sister was past foul.

D started to realise just exactly how screwed up he was. No wonder he didn't make friends. How long had it _been_ since somebody had liked him? He had teenage girls throwing themselves at him, offering their companionship and far too many marriage offers. They'd all been bored and scared of Frontier life, attracted to how much he'd piss off their parents. The people here seemed comfortable with how they were. He was starting to relax, for the first time in 12000 years.

Look where that had left him. His father was, perhaps for the first time, almost legitimately angry at him. _D_ had always been the good one. The killer of rogue vampires and the saver of damsels. He fought people that fought him and then he went on his way. He'd never tried to find the secrets of immortality by sleeping with human women or fiddling with the DNA of anybody that walked by. That was gone now.

He wasn't even that upset at losing the moral high ground. He was worried about Seras. Yet again his genetic lineage was biting him on the ass. He'd been capable of hurting her just because of who his Dad was. He actually had caused her harm because Alucard thought that giving your son a parastic, sentient, lecherous monster in your hand was a good idea. He had been hanging around her to piss the old man off but… she _had_ been his friend. She'd been nicer to him, without agenda, than anyone he'd ever met.

She was never going to want to talk to him again. He couldn't fix this. God, he felt sick. He wished that it was possible for him to die.

He actually found himself wanting to go home for the first time.

-------

There were not many true vampires wandering around the world. Most of the British ones live in Australia. It seemed that many of them thought it fitting to exile themselves to one of the colonies after the advent of Hellsing. It was a good choice, people never noticed the occasional backpacker going missing in the desert and there was a decent nightlife if you ventured into the cities. Well, most of the cities. Adelaide is a hole, you know?

Horatio was the only English vampire not to flee his homeland when vampire hunting became a sport. He'd hidden himself at first. It was easy. He'd been a member of the aristocracy to begin with and he had the means and motive for outlandish eccentricity. He spent one hundred years investing in arms development and obtaining nasty tools for killing on the black market. Although he was not the first to lay siege upon Hellsing he was the most unique.

He was driving a tank, for one thing.

It was not a pretty thing, although it had become less offensive in his eyes after he'd painted it charcoal grey. It _was_ effective, top of the market or so he'd been told. It had lots of missiles, lots and lots of them and when he pushed the yellow button jets of flame would spout from dual nozzles to the rear and front of the vehicle. He had named it the Deus ex Machina because… that was kind of what it was. It was the most welcome plot device he'd yet invested in. Some Germans, Russians, Americans and one confused fire-eater from New Zealand had been developing it for years at his behest.

All his effort was going to result in the total annihilation of his nemeses and the restoration of England as a haven to the nosferatu. He was one of _those_ vampires. The kind that wears nothing but black, wears his hair tied back with a ribbon and keeps a harem of vampire brides back at his isolated castle. He _would_ have had a harem were it not for the fact that every woman he'd turned had either left him or accidentally walked out into the sun. That was yet another reason why he felt the need to drive an armoured vehicle through a mansion owned by an attractive woman.

Horatio had enough skill to hide his presence until he reached the front gate. After that he gunned his giant phallic symbol and laughed maniacally. He wasn't very good at it. Not everyone could have Alucard's talent.

The heavy metal crumpled like aluminium foil.

Horatio pointed himself at the front door and then pressed on.

-------

Sometimes we need a little context. At the moment in time when Horatio destroyed the entranceway, Integra was finishing her thoughts about luck. Integra would have had to have been psychic to have timed such a dramatic lack of irony. The thing about life is, you see, that sometimes these weird things do happen by chance. It would be stranger if nothing peculiar ever did occur. This is ignoring vampires, rookie vampires, immortal priests, sterile vampires and their logically impossible offspring... and so on.

Integra watched the shiny, chic tank approach with a weary sigh. She raised a hand towards her temple and counted to ten backwards in Latin.

Then she swore loudly.

Let's say she stopped at "fuck!"


	9. Chapter Eight

**Chapter Eight: D waits and Seras doesn't.**

Seras could not stop crying. Her entire body was overcome with shame and fear. She couldn't remember how she'd gone from palling around with her friends to... _exposing_ herself to them and arguably the most important person in her life. It had almost been as though a voice had been inside her head, telling her what to do but... that was _mad_. It was so _completely_ insane that it was _entirely_ unbelievable. She was never going to be able to look Pip or Harry in the eye again, let alone her Master.

God damn it,_ why her_?

She heard a knock on her bedroom door but didn't answer it. She stayed in her coffin and hoped that whoever it was would think she was asleep or dead. As in, really dead so that whoever it was would have no choice but to leave her alone. She heard her door open and cursed her luck, her father and her treacherous body all at once. Walter lifted the lid of her coffin and gave her a small smile.

"I think we should have a little talk."

Seras' lips started to quiver and she managed to respond affirmatively before hugging him and staining his shirt with her bloody tears.

-------

Integra watched in horror as her front doors were incinerated.

"You Cu...!"

-------

"Seras, you should know that you are not at fault for your actions and Alucard does not hold you accountable."

"But he-he's so a-angry with, with me-hee…" Seras managed to choke around shuddering sobs, "He's never sounded so a-ashamed oh-of me."

"He was very angry to see you so upset but that's not the same as being ashamed of you. I can assure you that he acted only out of concern for your wellbeing."

"He t-old me to get out!"

"He wanted you out of harm's way," Walter patted her shoulder lightly, "He had words with D as soon as you were gone."

"What's Harry done?" Seras blushed hotly, "We were all drunk, _oh God_, I've never been drunk before and he hurt himself and I was… I was…"

"Neither you nor Harry are to blame but I must confess that this likely wouldn't have happened if you both had been less inebriated." He paused, "It would have helped if he had been more honest with us, truth be told."

The young vampire sniffed pitifully.

"Seras, there's something you should know."

-------

Integra ran for the steps to the second level, thanking God that all of the domestic staff had gone home for the evening.

-------

"I'm sure you've noticed that you're very loyal to young D."

"He's a nice man…"

"The day you met you did not intervene when he fought with Alucard."

Seras flinched and covered her face with her hands.

"You feel a sense of fidelity to both of them, it confuses your actions but again, it is not a fault." Walter sighed, "Alucard's blood runs through his veins and part of you recognises that."

"What does that have to do with me acting like such a stupid, stupid…"

Walter cut her off, "Do not say such things. D has been hiding something of himself and it was that part that hurt you this way."

"So, Harry..." Her voice broke on his name, "Hurt me?"

"No, I doubt he's thought of doing much past vexing his father since he arrived here. He has two entities in his body, one is D and the other lives in his left hand."

"What?" Seras looked up, alarmed and vaguely disgusted.

"We know next to nothing about it but it seems it is allowed a certain control over D when he is incapacitated and by proxy, control over you."

"But Master doesn't control me! Harry can't, he wouldn't allow it…"

"He stopped it when he stabbed his own hand."

-------

The stairs leading to Integra's office exploded just before she could reach them.

-------

Seras heard the sound of the blast just as she came to a rather large conclusion about the path she was taking through the world. Seras had been a law-enforcer for her entire adult life. True, she'd only been an adult for a few years and fighting the occult tended to lead towards breaking some important rules but that didn't change who she was at her core. The fact of it was that she couldn't allow for someone else to take that from her. She had to be in control to follow orders and to ignore them. She was not entertainment. She was not an object. She was not a doll.

She loved her Master and she liked her job and she was loyal to Sir Hellsing. She wasn't embarrassed about it and she _could not _allow herself to become a burden.

She kissed Walter on the cheek, grabbed her Halconnen from beside the doorway and ran for the fridge. She looked like a complete mess and she just didn't care.

-------

Integra looked behind herself and saw nothing but fire. When she looked ahead she saw the same thing.

-------

Seras eyed the medical blood with a growing sense of conviction. It wasn't the same as drinking blood from a human, she could sense that in her bones, but it would help. She needed all the strength she could get at that moment. She grabbed a packet and drank it as quickly as she possibly could. She grabbed another and set it between her teeth. She was ready to fight.

-------

Integra was beginning to feel her life flashing before her eyes but she wasn't sure it was just the smoke. The flames were beginning to close in and she couldn't get near to the basement or any of the windows. Alucard was also off sulking somewhere and likely hadn't heard any of commotion. She was suffering enough from smoke inhalation that she didn't think she'd even be able to call him at all, now.

So, this was her death then.

Fairly anticlimactic really.

A demon with a red face and giant fangs appeared in her peripheral vision. Maybe the burning would be painless if she was already hallucinating. The succubus, had to be a succubus with breasts that big, ran through the fire towards her. Her eyes were burning as much as the portraits of her ancestors were. The creature reached her side and threw Integra over her shoulder in a fireman's lift. Integra pondered the repercussions of firemen coming from hell as she was whisked outside.

Integra coughed for a few moments before the increased oxygen content restored her to fuller mental capacity. Seras was bowing reverently at her side, cheeks and lips streaked with blood. Integra coughed again.

"Seras."

"Yessir."

"I want you to kill that impertinent arsehole in the tank." Integra's face hardened further, "Make it hurt if you can."

"With pleasure, sir."

-------

Horatio had been having a wonderful time destroying Hellsing manor. The front half of the building was beginning to glow brighter than a particularly festive Christmas tree. He should have thought of this earlier. All the violence he was wreaking almost made his years of hiding worth it. Almost.

Horatio was not so busy congratulating himself that he didn't notice when his vehicle went from vertical to horizontal. He'd started pulling himself from his seat when he heard someone rip the hatch open and finish the job for him. In the next three seconds he found himself going from the comfy interior of his tank into the significantly less cozy branches of a tree, although for the life of him he couldn't figure out why. You need to understand that it really is very confusing when you don't understand why your arse is being handed to or even that you're getting a beating at all.

An ugly and (literally) smoking girl appeared in front of him but he didn't make the connection between her and his pain immediately. She frowned at him.

"I say, what on earth..." Horatio attempted polite conversation.

Seras reached down and rudely interrupted him by breaking his arm.

Horatio screamed like a little girl. It is not so bad to scream like a little girl when you _are_ a little girl... or even when you are a little boy because they're not so different at that stage, really. It is particularly embarrassing when you are several centuries old. Seras didn't laugh at him though, she didn't feel like wasting her time in that manner.

She used his moment of shock to break his other arm.

"You're wrecking my home."

Horatio felt shock slicing through his pain and it was all he could do not to gape at the fearsome horror before him.

"Were you aware of that?"

"Fuck off you traitorous whore!" his expletive was significantly weakened by his obvious fear. The girl glared.

"Don't tell me what to do." She moved forward again.

Horatio forced his right leg up into her chest and she skidded back a few metres. He rolled over and started to scramble as best he could, feet slipping over the grass. He found himself looking at a pair of immaculate black shoes, though not made by a designer he was familiar with. He looked up and found himself face to face with an old acquaintance of his from the good old days, the same man directly responsible for the current bad old days.

"Hello Dracula."

"Hello Horse-face." Dracula smiled at him.

Horatio chose that moment to run away. He rolled into the bushes and fell into the first large shadow he found.

-------

Seras looked upon her Master with a mixture of annoyance, pride and fear. She'd been quite happy handling the situation herself but at the same time seeing him walk in and scare another vampire away from Hellsing, effortlessly no less, made her love him all the more. She didn't know if he was still angry though, so she kept her distance.

Alucard breeched the chasm between them in two steps and ruffled a hand through her hair.

"Good job Seras." He said, without a trace of sarcasm, "Guard Integra while I hunt down Lord Horatio, I'll be back soon."

Seras stood there for a long moment while he was gone. Then she walked over to where Integra was and watched everybody evacuate from their burning building.

-------

Alucard had rarely felt so proud. He wished that he could have taken Seras with him to share this kill but she needed rest now. He could take her out with him another day, when she hadn't had such an eventful evening. For now it was enough that she had chased a true vampire away from their home. She'd been slow to start but perhaps the old saying was true, still waters run deep.

Alucard walked through the shadows, following the scent of Horatio's pain and embarrassment. He eventually found himself inside a vaguely familiar building. It had clearly been a place of business at one time. Horatio had managed to heal himself, there wasn't any blood on the carpet, but the idiot was still leaving a trail of dirt and soot behind him. Alucard followed the trail down several sets of stairs and into a wide foyer. Horatio was standing in the middle of it, looking decidedly worse for wear. Alucard was halfway across the floor before he registered that something was very wrong.

Alucard could smell wet fur and something close to sulphur. He looked up to see a dimension-ripping beast leering at him sightlessly. Alucard looked back over to Horatio, who was now smiling.

"I'll bet you have never seen creatures such as these before," Horatio grinned manically and patted one that had just walked up to him, "Even you are no match for them."

Alucard cocked his head to the side.

"You really are a giant fuckwit, do you know that?"

-------

D had been lying in his cell feeling so horrid that he'd barely smelt the smoke coming from outside his door. He was aware that he was so far beneath Hellsing that it really didn't affect him even if the whole building collapsed. D attempted to open his cell door but could not. Perhaps if he were not so weakened, he could leave and be of use. If wishes were fishes... He couldn't help anyone with things as they were.

He rested himself of the cold floor and watched the iron door refuse to move.

-------

When Pip, a few spare Geese and Walter made their way toward the front gate they saw Integra watching her manor burn and Seras watching Integra. They changed their trajectory and Pip took a place beside Seras while Walter moved to stand beside Integra. They heard sirens in the distance. They waited.

-------

Alucard decided to give Horatio some advice before he returned to report the severity of their situation to his Master.

Horatio, he said, I helped design those things. They used to try and take chunks of flesh out of people that had hand-reared them from birth. If they figure out that you aren't the same kind of vampire as that that made them, they will kill you on sight.

He paused.

I kind of hope they do.

Alucard turned on his heel and disappeared, leaving only a ghostly voice trailing in his wake.

Horatio, you are in so much shit it's almost unbelievable.


	10. Chapter Nine

**Chapter Nine: D contemplates the meaninglessness of existence.**

The fire department managed to extinguish the blaze that had engulfed most of Hellsing manor by the time morning came. The auxiliary weapons stores remained untouched but the main stash was now buried by metres of stone and wood. Alucard's ability to transport materials when shadow-jumping was limited by his wards, so Integra was unoptimistic about reaching them any time soon. She had enough materials to outfit thirty men and Seras still had her Halconnen, hastily thrown outside before she'd hefted Integra out of the blaze.

Her home might have burnt down, her suit might have been covered in ash and burnt in places but honestly, she'd been in worse scrapes than this.

Alucard returned and she waved away the assistant she'd talking to. He had taken far longer than she'd expected just to silence one vampire. His down-turned lips told her that things were not going to be quite that simple today. Hopefully there was only a hidden coven of some sort, perhaps Iscariot if they were unlucky.

"Well, Alucard, give me the bad news."

"Horatio summoned the DRBs to London, which explains their endemicity to England. This also explains why they disappeared after we investigated the Wepcom lab. He's keeping them there, on an inaccessible floor beneath all the rest."

"I note that you are referring to him in the present tense, do you have good reason?"

"Like I said, he's keeping them there." Alucard frowned even more, "They're unpredictable monsters, the only thing keeping them in place is Lord Horatio. His death won't guarantee that they return home, it will probably worsen the situation by removing what little control we do have."

"Can you summon them yourself once he's eliminated."

"It's been thousands of years since someone tried to control those animals, they won't allow it to happen twice within a few weeks. If we can chase them back to their home dimension and kill Horatio, they won't bother returning."

"So we shall be needing man-power then."

"I can distract Horatio for as long as it takes, the DRBs can be incapacitated by the Geese so long as they disrupt their olfactory sense."

"That simple?" Integra allowed her incredulity to enter into her voice.

"Simple, yes. Easy, no. Even if I had found and identified them from the beginning, we would still have been forced to find Horatio first and remove all the creatures in one step."

"Seras is in the boot of my BMW, I'd like to wait until evening so she can participate." Integra's fingers began to twitch for a cigar, now that she finally had information to work with, "The Geese will need all the help they can get and she fights like a tank."

Integra then remembered that all her fine cigars were likely burned into cheap black powder, possibly soggy from the fire-hoses, as of last night.

"Well, tell me what the odds are on this one."

"0.3 likelihood of success with elimination of 90 of hounds or better and minimum casualties. 0.2 likelihood of fatalities regardless of a positive or negative outcome." Alucard spat out the numbers as one might when reading from a newspaper, "I can give you more accurate numbers after we arrive there and I have a better idea of who will be participating."

There was a pregnant pause.

"Perhaps we shouldn't call James, then." they replied, in unison.

-------

Jareth rolled out of bed feeling a little worse for ware. He had ingested a liver killing quantity of whiskey last night and had barely managed to get home without chucking in the taxi home on the previous night. The telephone rang with all the kindness of an anarchistic cannibal in a room full of lesser royals. Jareth answered it to make the horror stop.

"Hello?"

There was a pause.

"BURNT DOWN? HOW?"

Jareth grabbed some instant coffee and a mug, then he put the kettle on.

"Yessir, I can be there by 1600 hours."

He pulled a spoon from his cutlery drawer and started spooning out sugar and coffee granules.

"No, Sarah isn't here…"

He dropped the coffee jar on his foot.

"No sir, I won't impugn Sarah's honour… Yes, I promise… I doubt I'd like that to happen very much at all, sir…"

-------

James stood in his kitchen, making pancakes. Lily waddled through the door and lowered herself onto the nearest chair. The kids were still asleep, tired from a late night spent hearing stories. James slid the last pancake onto the laden plate and carried it over to his wife. He picked up some lemon slices that he'd cut while he was moving. He put both in front of her and then sat there, hands cradling his face, while she squeezed the slices for juice and sprinkled sugar onto the pancakes. She smiled back.

"Don't you want any, love?"

He shook his head.

"In a minute, Sweetheart."

Lily reached over so he could put his hand in hers.

The phone rang.

"I wonder who that could be?" Lily asked, as she reached for the cordless phone on the table.

She hit the receive button.

"Who is it?"

There was a pause.

"Mum! How are you doing?"

-------

Walter gathered 25 men for the mission, at Pip and Sir Hellsing's recommendations. They were hoping to use Lord Horatio's predictable nature to lure out the DRBs. If he believed he was under siege he was likely to "throw his weight around in the manner in which an angry housefrau throws crockery," according to Alucard. The men were currently being carefully outfitted with gas masks. Walter was insisting that they use some very specific smoke-bombs that he had invented for the dimension rippers and nobody wanted to find out just what they could do to a man. They were hoping to be ready by sundown, so they could leave almost immediately after Seras awoke. She was wearing her mask while she slept and it was it was muffling her snoring beautifully.

"Are you sure about including Jareth, sir?" Walter allowed himself the luxury of his paternally-driven distaste, "He is exceedingly hung over."

"I am aware of that, according to Pip the man fights better when not impeded by his better judgement." Integra smiled, "Besides, if this proves to be untrue he will no longer be able to harass the secretarial staff."

"How shrewd of you." the corners of Walter's lips quirked upward.

"Let it never be said that I don't think of you, Walter."

-------

"Well, men." Pip began.

A very loud and feminine "A-hem!" interrupted him.

"…And vampire, we are about to participate in the systematic removal of the DRBs from merry England. While Alucard distracts the putain that burned down our illustrious centre of operations, we shall be forcing the rippers to return to their own dimension or eliminating them. Once Alucard determines that they are gone, he will silence his own target and we will all be able to get home by breakfast. Any questions?"

Someone near the back raised a hand.

"Oui?"

"What's a putain?"

"An whore."

Everyone murmured in an affirmative fashion.

"Who's ready to kill some monsters?"

The Geese, and their vampire, roared.

-------

Horatio distractedly flicked through the various surveillance cameras that covered the Wepcom complex. He'd spent a worried few hours coming to the conclusion that Dracula's scare tactics were just that. Now he was really bored. Even the beasts were lying around sleepily all over the place. He flicked through to the main foyer again. Nothing.

Wait…

Over in the corner, there was someone creeping over to the control panel he'd hidden behind a painting. They were tall and female… Light coloured hair… Wearing a mini for some bizarre reason. Probably just a thief, he snorted and reached for the alarm button. The girl turned around.

Mother of crap, it was that arm-breaking, hellion **bitch**!

Horatio unleashed the hounds, screaming girlishly all the way.

-------

It had been a long time since he'd heard _silence_.

The pain had started to recede a few hours prior but Lefty had yet to speak. His mind felt clear, for the first time in many years. D wondered if this how monks felt after you left them on a mountain for a while. Did they simply run out of distractions, like he had, and start asking themselves questions? D had space to wonder about his _place_ in all this chaos. Part of him felt that he should be outside contributing but things had been going smoothly long before he arrived and everyone was likely coping without him now. If he didn't do the job, somebody else would. If that was the case, though, what was his purpose in life?

How long had he been this broken?

The world he'd left behind was still filled with monstrous abominations. From the vampires to the humans to the beasts they had created. Everywhere he went he was surrounded by their madness and if not theirs, the shades left by his father to torment him. Did Alucard even remember these things? Did he remember what he had left to the people? Those poor children in Tsepesh… Those images of his mother during his own _conception_…

D had been drifting through the ether for a long time, his memory shot to pieces. Part of him knew it. The humans were affected by it too. The years flew by like seconds. He bought medicine and almost used it years past its prime on that hunter girl, Leila? Was that her name? If his hand had not reminded him he might have caused more harm than good. Sometimes he would dream of a spice, of gray metal, of a cross and he would know that something important was eluding him.

Now he at least had someone to ask about such things. He could wait this out. It was almost comforting not to have to go anywhere and the stone walls were closer to 'home' than anything else had been since he'd arrived. He was going to let himself sleep for a while and then he was going to wake up. It was a very welcome thought.

-------

Horatio sensed him before he saw him.

He tried to put off turning around for as long as possible. Denial was completely under-rated, he felt. Sadly, it was very difficult to ignore someone when they started talking to you.

"It's a lovely night, isn't it?"

Horatio decided not to be gracious about it.

"Frankly, I think fucking not." he drew himself up to his full height, "And your hat looks bloody ridiculous, you self-righteous bastard."

-------

Seras had her mask on the moment she smelt wet fur. When she looked towards the left and right corridors, she could see about twenty of the beasts. Most of them were bloody enormous, at least up to her waist, with noses like a microchiropteran bat. She was sort of glad that Integra had given her those encyclopaedias for Christmas or she wouldn't have had any basis for comparison.

She reached toward her belt and pulled off a small sphere labelled 'The Bomb'. She really wasn't sure it was wise to let the thing go off while she was still in the room but she also didn't feel it was right of her to question Walter's newest tool of war. The dimension-rippers all perked at the sound of a pin being pulled and dropped to the floor. Seras rolled 'The Bomb' towards them. The closest monster sniffed it, curiously.

Closely pack solid-something expanded into gas and threw Seras into the bullet-proof glass doors. It did kinda hurt but at least she wasn't howling like the eyeless dogs were. If they weren't so violently scary she'd have felt bad about it. The Geese rushed in through the front entrance, Pip stopping to give her a thumbs up, guns blazing. Even in all the confusion, Seras saw half of the creatures disappear into thin air.

Seras pulled out a pistol, there was no space to accommodate the Halconnen, and started aiming at the ones that popped back into existence above the heads of the Geese. It was so strange, they didn't make a sound when they did it. She tried to keep herself focused on abrupt movements but everything was an abrupt movement… She twisted to the left and had to pull her arms at the last minute to avoid shooting Pip.

He was riding one of the damn things, how the hell had he managed that?

"Seras," he shouted over the din, not bothering with radio or bothered by the mask muffling him, "They have gothic castles in their dimension!"

Oh, sweet Jesus.

She shot the monster Pip was riding in the frontal lobes. Pip was thrown over the reception desk and Seras fired another round at a smaller DRB that was dropping in on him. It shifted dimensions and avoided the shot. Seras swore. Pip appeared from under the desk and glared at her.

She was going to have words with him later.

* * *

I've been trying to keep the AN down to a minimum but I thought I'd throw in a few things here.

Firstly, thanks to everybody who reviewed and special thanks to Greece for the crit and Spas for being so nice about it the whole way through. I know a lot of people have been asking about the Harry thing, so I'll give a quick explanation here.

D isn't D's real name, in the first book Lefthand thinks it's an interesting name for him to pick. Given that, I decided that it'd be funny if the pretentious, socially-awkward little bunny was over-compensating for a name he did not like. Hence, Harold. It embarasses him and watching a godlike figure get knocked down a peg amuses me with great justice. Consider it my revenge for how insanely over-powered he is in the books (he's a far more even character in Bloodlust) and another cause for his decision to emotionally detach from... well... everything.


	11. Chapter Ten

**Chapter Ten: D is Alucard****'****s last hope.**

Alucard smiled at Horatio because he knew it was unnerving. He was secretly offended by the hat comment but so long as his bloodlust was slaked by the end of the evening he felt he'd get over it. Even if Horatio _was_ a piss-poor excuse for a vampire, at least he was a true Nosferatu. If not a No-Life King, then at least Duke or a Lord of some description or maybe an uppity bastard child… He was digressing.

"Horatio, let us at least conduct our affairs like the gentlemen we are."

"One would hardly consider you gentle, Dracula," Horatio steeled himself as much as he was able, which wasn't much, "You've cornered me, so I will defend myself."

Horatio broke into pieces of midnight and threw himself at Alucard.

"Now that's more like it," he said and smiled with all his pointy teeth.

-------

They were everywhere. The monsters were just… everywhere. They'd been sluggish on the ground but now they were hopping portals with every step they took. They had taken down eight of them outright but every one since had been an uphill battle. It was taking all of Pip's skill not to accidentally shoot one of his own men. He couldn't risk a second strafe, the beasts would have been on the Geese like white on rice the moment they hit the floor.

Malcolm (who had missed the previous night's festivities on account of being a teetotaller) screamed and Pip threw his favourite bowie knife towards him on reflex. He cheered internally when he heard a cut off howl in reply. Malcolm was wedged in a corner, now trapped under _half a tonne _of ugly, eyeless dog (if you were feeling a tad hyperbolic, as Pip was). Pip ducked under the flying body of Jareth and wrenched his knife from the animal's skull. He heard Jareth hit the glass doors and start swearing, so he presumed he was still alright.

"SERAS!"

"No need to shout captain." Seras dodged over toward him and their fallen comrade.

Seras picked the monster up, checked it wasn't attached to anything vital of Malcolm's and then threw it one of it's brethren that was crouching on the sidelines. She picked Malcolm up and ran for the entrance. Pip covered them. He shot two, _two of the things,_ by some miracle, out of the air while he was running.

Norris and Robson were standing almost back to back, up against the far wall. One of the rookies was behind them, bleeding casually all over the place but the ground around them was littered with beasts. Seras almost threw Malcolm outside and started running for them. A DRB phased in right on top of Norris. He didn't even have time to get his gun up past chest height. Seras grabbed the beast by the head and twisted, arms straining.

Pip waited to check it was dead and then started shooting elsewhere.

"How many is that?" He yelled.

"Fourteen and counting, sir!" Replied one of the men outside.

"Lucky they're just guarding the inside of this place, oui?"

A DRB appeared above one of the medics. Malcolm managed to throw off a shot at its chest and it phased out.

"Captain, you are such a damn Jinx!" Seras shrieked, running towards the exit again, this time with the rookie on her back.

"Just shut up and mind the wounded, would you dear?"

-------

Alucard's hounds screamed when the shards hit them. It was _such_ a clever move. He'd have to save it for himself, later. He drew the Jackal and fired three rounds into the maelstrom that Horatio had become. All things come in threes, even bullets. He pulled back the hounds and let himself be carved down to his bones. He spread his blood around the room and reached up, catching pieces of his adversary and throwing them as far apart as he could manage.

For those of you who remember that Alucard is mathematically inclined, think 'space-filling curve'.

Horatio realised more quickly than Alucard would have thought him capable and ripped himself back together. Alucard stayed as he was, eyes floating in a sea of black blood.

"You _are_ a creepy bastard, with no aesthetic sensibilities whatsoever, aren't you?" Alucard allowed a smile to arise from his liquid form.

"At least I'm good at surrounding myself with attractive young women, unlike someone else we know."

"You ran all of them off to the colonies!"

Horatio turned on a heel and strode into the nearest shadow. Alucard reluctantly reformed his legs and went after him. He walked right into a silver blade. He quirked an eyebrow at it and then glared at the vampire grasping its golden hilt.

"That hurts." he said and then fired a bullet into Horatio's shoulder.

Horatio punched him in the head in retaliation and threw his weight into the sword with all his strength. Alucard's back hit a wall and started sizzling. He glanced back and saw it was covered in holy paraphernalia, crosses, relics, sheets of paper from the bible and…

"Is that a picture of Integra?"

-------

"How many?" Pip shouted out hoarsely.

"Four left, Captain!" replied a harried-looking Norris.

"FUCK!"

-------

"Why is there a picture of my Master on your abomination of a holy wall?"

"I put up images of all my enemies!"

"Then why can I see Seras' photo and not my own?"

"I skewered you onto yours."

"Likely story."

Alucard looked up.

He blanched, just a little.

Alucard glared at Horatio. He took hold of the curved handle of the blade and pulled it from his belly. Horatio gulped visibly and seemed too surprised to move immediately. Alucard punched him so hard his neck snapped backwards.

"I do not appreciate you taking voyeuristic photographs of the women in my life." He grated out, "It is exceedingly disrespectful."

A clawed hand extended itself from Horatio's lax mouth and took a swipe at him. It missed but tens more of them were sprouting from it. Alucard knew it wasn't time yet, so he decided to dodge and kept himself focused on the beating of Horatio's shrivelled heart. If the Geese didn't hurry up he was either going to get hurt or worse, _bored_.

-------

Pip nailed one in the shoulder just as it was about to bisect Robson. It landed heavily against the glass doors, creating a tree of fracture lines, before phasing away. He turned around in time to see Seras swinging the reception desktop into the neck of a beast as it tried to blindside him. It fell to ground gasping shortly.

Then there was silence.

-------

Alucard felt it, the moment they were all gone. He stepped away from the demon hands, pulled his Casull and aimed it at the shadows.

"You've fought well, old man." He said, "Next time, spend less effort on hiding and you might just win."

He fired and hit Horatio's heart, carefully hidden out of sight but not earshot.

"See you in another lifetime." He murmured quietly.

-------

Seras shifted from foot to foot, tabletop at the ready to hit the next creature that materialised. Nothing came.

-------

Alucard looked down at Horatio and waited. He listened for a long moment until it was clear enough that none of the beasts had returned. He could feel that Seras had survived and was fairly floating in relief, which meant that everyone else had too. Horatio stayed still, his neck bent unnaturally behind him. 30 per cent probability of success, indeed. Alucard turned around and Horatio twitched.

"Fuck you," he whispered and twisted his hands in an ornate gesture.

Alucard shot him again but he was already too late.

-------

Pip was smiling underneath his mask like a sonofabitch, deliriously happy that he was still alive. He dropped his standard issue pistol, custom made and named by Walter to suit it's purpose, onto the floor. He'd spent his last bullet saving Rob. What conveniently nerve-wracking timing.

"Well, Seras, looks like we made it." He rasped, eyes scrunched into joyous crescents.

She returned his grin immediately, he could see it in her cheek bones, but lost it just as quickly.

"Captain, move!"

Pip turned to see one last DRB, the one he'd sent tumbling into the plexiglass, snarling at him. Pip suddenly came to the startling conclusion that he was going to die. Little details came into sharp focus, the hair drifting around Seras' face as she ran at him, the fluted nose on the beast, the Darth Vader sound of his own breath through his mask…

Seras tackled the beast in mid air and both of them disappeared.

Alucard jumped out of the wall.

Time sped up again.

Alucard roared and all the windows shattered.

-------

Integra heard Alucard, even though she was miles away, carefully orchestrating the transfer of headquarters to a temporary location along with the rebuilding of her birthright. From the anger that she could feel through the wards, from the bone-deep despair, she learned that Seras was gone from them. It was like the Valentine incident all over again.

Integra sat down on the rickety school chair and table that were serving as her desk. She allowed herself to rest her head against her hand.

"Walter, do you have a moment?" She called, voice level.

He came in bearing tea that was made from leaves that he kept upon his person but served in a mug proclaiming 'Life's funny, hain't it?'. He put the steaming cup down in front of her.

"What went wrong, sir?"

"Something has happened to Seras."

Walter went pale. He sat down in the chair opposite hers and mirrored her by placing a hand over his face.

"Oh, oh no." He managed.

Integra pushed the cup over towards him. He took a sip of the tea and passed it back.

-------

D woke up to see his father looking down at him. His glasses and his hat were missing and his eyes were wild. D unclasped his hands from their place on his chest and sat up.

"What went wrong?"

"Seras is gone."

D digested that information for a moment.

"Irrevocably?"

Alucard ran a hand through his hair. His jaw clenched and unclenched rhythmically. D waited for him to be able to speak again.

"I can't get her back." Alucard stared mournfully at the stone walls around them.

"It was the dimension-ripping beasts, wasn't it?" D asked, "You went after them once the fire burnt out?"

"Yes, that's the long and short of it."

"She's alive though or you wouldn't be here." D flexed his left hand to see if he could get the circulation going, "Which means there's still hope."

Alucard didn't say anything.

"I need to know some things," He replied, softly but deadly serious, "After that you can tell me what you need me to do."

* * *

Again, sorry for the AN. I was supposed to post this yesterday but I spent the night with family and forgot my laptop.


	12. Chapter Eleven

**Chapter Eleven: D mends.**

"There's something wrong with the people back home," D said, blankly looking at the wall before him, "Something that affects me too."

D half expected Alucard to laugh and was slightly surprised when he grunted affirmatively instead.

"I forget things." He continued, "I can name every vampire I've ever hunted, down to their rank but damned if I could tell you how I killed half of them. If I try to think about it too hard my head begins to hurt and my vision blurs. The best I can remember is an excited discussion I had with a doctor once about DNA and yellow powder. Every other instance has been improvised or is too fuzzy around the edges for me to latch onto it."

D pulled an old, browned piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to his father. He unfolded it.

"This is a cross…" Alucard said, slightly perplexed.

D flinched, awareness bloomed and shrivelled in his eyes. He blinked and carried on speaking regardless.

"Nobody knows what it is, I've asked everywhere I've travelled. All I know is that it is important."

"It seemed like a good idea, at the time," Alucard said wearily, "Engineering the humans so they wouldn't remember the symbols."

"You would think that a piss-poor trait like that would get bred out after a few hundred generations, wouldn't you?"

"Our geneticists did good work."

"Humans are often glorified savages on the frontier, your 'geneticists' removed the moral drive against incest, for heaven's sake." D spat, trying not to think of the Marcus brothers.

"I have more respect for mortals now." Alucard sighed, "They were trying to remove heritable diseases from the gene pool, I did not consider the effect that might have on human social structures."

"Without meaning disrespect, I don't think you considered much at all when you were embroiled in that period of your life."

"D!" Alucard snapped his teeth, warning implicit. D quieted him with a sad, considering look.

"You left shades of yourself, all over the place." D's voice caught, despite his carefully maintained calm, "I find one every few years and whenever I do they show me the most awful things."

Alucard winced involuntarily.

"A few years ago I visited a town where some of the children were kidnapped and replaced after some… editing… took place. I found an image of you that claimed responsibility for it. It told me I was another experiment. It showed me Mum and it did some vile things to her." His voice trailed, "The children turned to dust a few days after it left, from the strain of what had been done to them."

"Father, there are monsters everywhere and I can't even plan a way of changing things as they are. I need you to fix me, I know you can do it."

"You're not going to like this, D." Alucard frowned and worried at his lip a little.

D shrugged in response.

"It can't be any worse than not knowing."

-------

"You're right, I don't like it."

"It's blood D, the honourable Anne Rice notes its properties with regards to carrying both memory and power." He snorted, "Although she also laboured under the misapprehension that it made us all camper than a row of tent pegs."

D shifted uncomfortably and rubbed his aching hand.

"So, how do we go about doing this?"

"The usual way."

"I can't just turn the vampiric side of me on and off like you do, it happens on its own."

"Usually when you're thinking about attractive mortals of your preferred gender?"

"Dad!" D squawked, before realising just what he was saying.

Alucard smiled warmly, "There's no judgement here, just saying I don't mind who you sleep with so long as it's not your sister."

"I don't have a sister! She's your servant, you said so!"

"Don't go sleeping with the help then…"

"Jesus, you're such a," D flustered, subconsciously relieved that Alucard seemed to have forgiven him for his unsuspecting part in the unpleasantness, "Look, I don't know how make these things work, help me and stop bringing up the, the stuff."

"You're more vampire than you think you are, dolt, or haven't you noticed the fact that your clothes keep mending themselves."

D looked down at his leathers, there were no bullet-holes or patches. They were probably a new set.

"You have no concept of the passage of time at all, do you?" Alucard rubbed his brow ridges, "You were shot, repeatedly I might add, just a few days ago. When you were off playing cowboys with Pip's hired goon squad."

"I didn't change between now and then?"

"You were thrown in this cell between now and then."

"Oh."

"Indeed."

"This explains so much about me."

Alucard turned a quizzical look at his son. The boy had clearly finally gone off the deep end because he was smiling like an idiot. Although, given that they didn't spend much time together, perhaps he _was_ an idiot and that was just a normal smile.

"Twelve thousand years would be enough to make anybody a little complacent about the relativity of time." D's eyes had shed the weight of millennia and he finally looked about as old as his body was, "I need you to hit me."

Alucard backhanded him.

"Why?"

D grimaced and his teeth were red and pointy.

"Helps me bring them out."

Alucard pulled his coat-sleeve back and ran his thumb nail across the most obvious vein. Black blood oozed down his wrist. D's jaws sprung open like a snake's and he bit down.

He pulled back after the shortest moment, gasping for air. Alucard hmmed in an impressed fashion.

"You've got good self control, I'll give you that." He said, "Tell me what you know about the family business, then."

"The .454 Casull is 39cm long and takes explosive silver-core rounds specifically designed for combat with the undead. It has a fifteen round magazine, although you cheat and make it larger using your now limited ability to open dimensional portals." D blushed despite himself, "And you prefer blondes."

"Which is roughly all we need to worry about in terms of our traditions of violence and womanising almost everyone."

They sat back for a moment while D savoured his new-found clarity.

"Hey, how come you never warned me away from your Master?"

"Didn't have to, she's not your type and she'd kill you if you tried anything."

"Oh."

"So, now that we've covered the basics in this little tête á tête, I want to ask you a favour."

"Name it."

"Let me send you back." Alucard frowned slightly, "I know it's abrupt and I will need your help to do it because of the wards…"

D cut him off, "You don't want to leave her there on her own, I know."

Alucard reached into his pocket and pulled out the letter that had inadvertently started their rift in the first place. He gingerly passed it over to D. D admired his father's flowing script for a moment, the stored it carefully inside his breast pocket.

"You likely won't believe this but it's been good to have you wandering about the place," he grumbled, "Exactly like the old days."

"Mum used to get quite angry about that, didn't she?"

"She was always on your bloody side too."

"Like hell," D swung into a falsetto, "D, you should show more respect to your father, you know he means well."

D turned towards his father, face showing more vulnerability than it had in a long time.

"Was I an experiment?"

"Ah, so that's what you meant about seeing vile things about your mother."

"Alucard…"

"I have done some terrible things in my day and only some of them were well intentioned." he clasped his gloved hands and rested them on his knees, "I may have been playing God at the time but I have always loved your mother and we both wanted you."

"Thanks."

"On the other hand, you have been a giant pain in the arse since those misguided days spent in anticipation of your birth."

"Likewise, you lecherous buffoon."

Alucard stood and tugged the edges of his gloves.

"I can open the door home but you will have to run the yards yourself and find the right path." Alucard crossed his wrists, "You should be able to tell by scent and Lefty can help you with directions."

"I'm not sure that's an excellent idea."

"It's in his nature to cause mischief but I do think he knows better now." Alucard bared his teeth, "He knows I take family matters very seriously."

D shook his hand and felt Lefty shift for the first time in over a day. He could feel his symbiont twisting its lips and nodding reluctantly. He was going to invest in a pair of gloves the minute he got home. Some things could not be forgiven so easily, even with a history like theirs.

Alucard drew his arms wide and the room was enveloped in shadow. Lefty breathed in and D tasted the dusty smell of the Frontier.

"Do you have anything else that you would like Seras to know?" D asked, already seeing home in the distance.

"Tell her the Geese are all worried sick but I'm going to reassure them. Make sure to give her my note and send my good wishes. I know everyone is going to miss her terribly but if she gives herself enough time and doesn't rush, she'll be able to make it back soon enough… I've written it all down for her." He paused, "Make sure she drinks every now and again, there are plenty of moral reprobates around the place, remind her not to be too trusting of strangers and… Tell her that I'm very proud of how she's handled herself these past few weeks."

"I will."

Alucard sighed a little.

"I'm pleased with how you've handled yourself as well, ignoring you drinking yourself insensate and, well, I'll visit as soon as I can." He flexed his warded gloves and seemed to trip a little over his next words, "I think you've grown up a bit since this whole thing started."

Alucard and D looked at each other for a long moment. D held out his right hand and Alucard clasped it warmly in his. Then he gave him an awkward, one-handed hug.

He let go after exactly two seconds.

"Take care, Dad."

"Bye, son."

Then D turned towards the Frontier and didn't look back.

* * *

This is the penultimate chapter, after this ther's only chapter 12 and the epilogue to go. 


	13. Chapter Twelve

**Chapter Twelve: D runs around, Hellsing rebuilds.**

When Alucard walked through the wall of Integra's makeshift office, he didn't expect to see _all_ the Geese and half the domestic staff there. He was surprised that they even fitted but apparently Walter had upgraded the tiny demountables they'd been using for some kind of giant tent. Integra was frowning sadly, though stoically, at him. Pip was leaning on her desk, his lone eye suspiciously red. It seemed he'd been keeping a lot of people waiting.

"So, Alucard, what of Seras?" asked his Master.

"She's stuck where she is." He replied, seeing a pregnant woman standing near the back of the crowd, sniffling along with some of the secretaries. "Even if you released me to level zero."

Pip swore loudly and the Geese erupted into a cacophony of despairing cries. Some of the typists started crying a little.

"I can only open doors between dimensions, so I made one for D as soon as I was able, when he sniffs his way back she'll at least have someone looking out for her." Alucard didn't want anyone pestering him about dimension hopping, he wasn't a travel agent, "You're all Protestants, have a little faith."

"I'm Catholic, actually," said James, who was wearing skivvies and holding up a very bruised looking Jareth.

"Yes, James, the baptisms were giving it away but we are all pretending that we do not know because of our rather tumultuous relationship with the Vatican." Said Integra levelly.

"Oh, sorry."

"She's a _vampire_, she will be more than fine. There's not much more I can tell you, I'm afraid." Alucard projected so those at the back could hear him, "With your permission, Master, I would like to avoid the daylight so much as I can."

Integra knew that something as trivial as daylight was not going to be an issue for him but she let him go regardless. He phased through the tent wall, away from the human din and directly into the cool darkness of Hellsing's basement. He could still smell the smoke, heady and fragrant to the warrior in him. He walked down to Seras' room and lingered for a moment at her door. He touched the handle with a passing reverence before twisting it slowly. Her bedside table was cluttered with pictures, mostly of the Geese but also of Integra, Walter and two people who were surely her parents. One stood out from the rest, a small print of a dark-haired man wearing a severe expression and regal attire.

Oh, that was a picture of _him_.

Alucard plucked the framed image from its brethren and gave it a critical eye. It wasn't half bad, really, although clearly it hadn't been painted by anyone that knew him. He put it down again and took another, a graduation shot of Seras and some other policemen. He smiled wryly back at her grinning face and sat down on her coffin. He breathed in, still able to smell Seras, a blend lavender soap and copper, in the small room. He lent his head against the stone wall and exhaled deeply. Then he let himself rest for a little while.

-------

It took Pip days to get Alucard alone.

"James and Lily went for an ultrasound the other day," He said casually, "It's a petite fille, they're naming her Seras."

Alucard pretended valiantly that he was not pleased at this eventuation.

"Integra has almost finished with the architects…"

"Are we going to be experiencing a classic redesign or is she going to go all modern on us?"

"No, I mean she's about ready to fire them." Pip smiled, "She might even let you eat one."

"After what happened with that shonky accountant, I doubt it."

Pip laughed jovially but he lacked his usual enthusiasm.

"Alucard, I have some questions to ask you about this immortality deal, if you don't mind."

"I hate to break it to you but you're about as close to being virginal as a flatworm is to self-propelled flight."

"I would hope so…" Pip frowned, "But I want to see our Seras again, even if I have to wait a thousand years."

Alucard looked off into the distance. He frowned grumpily. A hundred metres from the main gate he could see Integra's Tent of War (one of the Geese had graffitied the slogan onto all sides of it one morning) and Jareth doing his physiotherapy on the lawn with the help of Sarah the secretary. Walter was keeping a watchful, though slightly pointed, eye on them. Pip fidgeted after a minute and opened his mouth. Alucard shushed him with an index finger. Statistics danced behind his eyes.

"I'm thinking about it."

-------

Integra was almost to the point of banging her head against a wall. The idiots that she'd insured the manor with were being most reluctant in their duties of handing over money for repairs. It wasn't her fault they hadn't considered exactly why she would want coverage from tank damage on her contract. She was about a day away from sending Alucard after them. She was now down a vampire, one that she had been fond of, down a headquarters, down a home, the men were all in poor spirits and worst of all she was _completely lacking_ in cigars.

Oh, she was willing to kill someone for a smoke.

"Seras would have done something charming by today and everything would have picked up," She told herself.

Then she reminded herself that self-pity was a emotion for commoners and that it was a poor reflection on her mental health that she had started talking to herself. Really, what would her father say? Integra called up a Swiss bank that had, among other, more interesting items, a set of floor plans for the manor. She decided that she may as well keep those details as they were. Perhaps the Queen would know of some suitable builders…

Walter came in bearing tea service, a silver flask of scotch and a packet of cigars.

"Walter, don't you ever defect on me." She said, laughter hiding under her weariness.

"Of course not, Sir." Walter replied, deadly serious.

-------

D fell into his home dimension with a grunt and an ungainly somersault. He was stopped rather abruptly by a tree stump. His delicate nostrils were assaulted with a charming mixture of dust and sulphur that was endemic to monster-rich corners of the Frontier. Ahhh, he thought, _home. _He opened his eyes carefully to see his horse staring at him and decided that something was just a little wrong, although he couldn't quite put his finger on what it could be. He lay back on the dry grass for a moment and used a hand to shield his eyes from the sun.

The sun!

D scrambled to his feet, sending clods of dirt flying and spooking his horse into a prancing jump. He twisted on his heels, furiously scouting the terrain for any sign of Seras. He saw a dead dimension ripping beast spread out on the dry plane that encompassed most of the region. She wouldn't have headed into that wasteland on her own though, so he ignored it. He scanned around the few caves that hid around the vampire stronghold, then saw scuff marks trailing up the hill, leading towards Castle Iocus. He quickly touched his fingers to one and they came away damp. She had passed by not long ago… He could only hope that he was being mislead by morning dew, it was barely past ten, if he was lucky…

But dhampires are not known for their luck.

D ran up the hillside towards Castle, shouting as he went.

"Seras? Seras, can you hear me?"

He sprinted towards the entrance hall as soon as he hit level ground, wrapping a bandage around his left hand as he went. If she'd gotten caught by the traps inside, if she hadn't been fast enough, if _he_ wasn't fast enough. He barrelled into the doors and kept moving.

"Seras!"

"**Ow!**"

D stopped and asked himself if turning around would just lead to one more disappointment in his rather tragic life. He looked over his shoulder, just in case. He saw Seras glaring lightly and rubbing her nose.

"You pushed a door into me!" She complained, lips turning downward as she pushed it closed again to keep out the light.

"I'm sorry." D whispered.

"You really need to slow down a little Harry, at least sometimes." She chided, "Although I am very glad to see you, say, is this your house? It's very big."

"Um, no." D was finding it very hard to move so he decided to try apologising again, "I'm so sorry."

"For not having a giant house?" She replied, "That's a bit of a relief anyway, I'd be worried if you lived in a scary place like this on your own."

"I mean, Seras, I, I want to say I'm so sorry, for _everything__…_" Seras cut him off.

"It's ok, shh, I'm fine, I'm not blaming you…" She surreptitiously looked towards his left hand and he quickly held it up so she could see that he'd bandaged it.

"I'm sorry for that, I should have told you all but I didn't think something like that could ever… I'll never let it happen again, I promise you!" He gushed, heavily embarrassed but too involved to stop himself.

Seras hugged him. He couldn't find words after that.

"I forgive you, you didn't mean for it to happen," She soothed, "We're going to be fine."

D pulled back a little so he could take her letter out. He handed it to her. She looked at it quizzically then looked up at D again. He gestured lightly at the note. She pulled off one of her gloves and opened it with meticulous care. She read it quickly and by the end her hands had lost their usual steadiness. One surprised tear fell from her eye and D caught it with his thumb.

"He called me _Victoria_," She whispered, a little awed.

"He said he was proud of you and that he's going to take care of the Geese," He coughed out, "He said he'd visit someday when the option opened up, if you don't make it back first."

Seras smiled again, at what she saw on the creamy paper and then she smiled at D.

"I think we're going to have to get me a new gun."

D laughed, relieved and overflowing.

"Oh, by the way," Seras pulled a bright blue pendant out of her shirt, "I found this on the carpet when I got here, is it yours?"

* * *

Just the epilogue to go... **NB** Once I post the epilogue I'm going to change DDDA's category to Hellsing, until I change my mind again about who the main focus is... I ended up spending more time on Hellsing than I anticipated...


	14. Epilogue

**Epilogue:**

Elena ran through the poppy fields outside her house in joyous abandon. She turned towards the setting sun and stuck out her tongue, just to prove that not even the night could quell her vibrant spirit. She spun among the flowers, petals whirling in her wake, and allowed herself to slow as she twisted towards the horizon.

One day, one day she would go there and then everyone would know her name.

A darkly clad man crested the farthest hill as soon as that thought blossomed in her mind. He was beautiful, pensive, so utterly pure that it made her heart ache for him. His eyes were filled with powerful focus and determination. She could feel even from such a distance that this man was surely her soul mate, surely in need of her to give light to his evening life. She was drawn to him as the moth is to the flame.

He looked towards the village for a moment and then turned back, perhaps considering his arduous and adventurous travels. Elena knew that life was about the journey and she would be more than glad to share his.

Elena's moment was abruptly broken when another person clumped into view. It was an unappealingly solid girl hefting a large pack and a heavy case. Perhaps the lovely man was employing her as a servant, thought Elena…

The ebony-haired youth smiled warmly at the girl and it transformed his face from the ethereal to the sublime. It was just such a smile. The girl smiled back and said something that was lost to the winds. The gorgeous man laughed in response. He reached out a hand to her and she clasped it companionably for a moment. Then they both started ambling together toward town.

Elena tromped back home alone, brushing grass from her skirt and grumbling all the while.

* * *

Well, I had a lot of fun writing this story. Thanks again to everyone that reviewed. I know that this has seemed an unsatisfatory conclusion to some but... It wasn't meant to be a real conclusion but an opening to other things. I may write some more of it but as it stands, this is...

The End.


End file.
